Electronic Music School: A Contemporary Approach to Teaching Musical Creativity 2021008666, 2021008667, 9780190076641, 9780190076634, 9780190076665

Citation preview

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Electronic Music School

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Electronic Music School A CONTEMPORARY APPROACH TO TEACHING MUSICAL CREATIVITY

Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein

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1 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. © Oxford University Press 2021 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data Names: Kuhn, Will, author. | Hein, Ethan, author. Title: Electronic music school : a contemporary approach to teaching musical creativity / Will Kuhn, and Ethan Hein. Description: New York : Oxford University Press, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2021008666 (print) | LCCN 2021008667 (ebook) | ISBN 9780190076641 (paperback) | ISBN 9780190076634 (hardback) | ISBN 9780190076665 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Computer music—Instruction and study. | Electronic music—Instruction and study. | Ableton Live. Classification: LCC MT723 .K84 2021 (print) | LCC MT723 (ebook) | DDC 786.7/6—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021008666 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021008667 DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.001.0001 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Paperback printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America Hardback printed by Bridgeport National Bindery, Inc., United States of America

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CONTENTS Foreword by Adam Neely  •  xv Preface: The Music Class at the End of the World  •  xvii Acknowledgments  •  xxi To the Reader  •  xxv To Public School Teachers  •  xxv To Independent Music Teachers  •  xxv To Everyone  •  xxvi

PART I  WHAT YOU NEED TO START YOUR OWN ELECTRONIC MUSIC SCHOOL  •  1 1 Toward a Creative Music Curriculum  •  3

1.1. The Creative Music Teacher  •  3 1.2. Addressing Students Who Typically Don’t Take Music Classes (The Other Eighty Percent)  •  5 1.3. How Music Technology Can Fit into a Broader Performing Arts Curriculum  •  7 1.4. The Divide Between Music Teachers’ Definition of Music and Students’ Definition of Music  •  8

2 An Art Class for Music  •  12

2.1. Portfolio Creation  •  12 2.2. Computer as Tool Versus Computer as Medium  •  13 2.3. Songwriting and Sound Creation  •  14 2.4. Remixing •  15 2.5. Sampling •  15

3 Understanding What a School Really Wants  •  19

3.1. Who Makes Decisions About Curriculum?  •  19 3.1.1. The Teacher  •  19 3.1.2. Administrators •  19 3.2. Selling the Lab-​Based Music Course  •  20 3.2.1. Administrators and School Leaders  •  20 3.2.2. Teachers •  21 3.2.3. Parents •  21 3.2.4. Students •  21 3.3. How Music Tech Benefits the Master Schedule  •  22 3.4. How Music Tech Benefits the Music Department’s Profile  •  22 3.5. Sweetening the Deal with Graduation Requirements  •  23 3.6. Getting Funding and Staying Funded  •  23 3.7. Protecting Your Investment  •  24 3.8. Criticisms of a Nontraditional Music Class  •  25

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4 Tech You Will Need for Your Program  •  27

4.1. The Computer  •  27 4.2. Headphones •  28 4.3. MIDI Input Devices  •  28 4.4. Getting a Space  •  31 4.5. Possible Room Configurations  •  32 4.6. Choosing Other Hardware for the Lab  •  33 4.7. Setting Up an Individual Station  •  34 4.8. Building on Existing Infrastructure  •  34 4.9. Day-​to-​Day Considerations  •  36 4.10. Maintenance and Cleaning  •  37

5 Ableton Live and Push  •  40

5.1. An Optimal Setup  •  40 5.2. Why These Tools?  •  41 5.3. Ableton Live Basics: Arrangement View and Session View  •  41 5.4. Ableton Push Overview  •  42 5.4.1. Do You Really Need One?  •  43 5.4.2. Techniques Afforded by Push  •  43 5.4.3. Drum Programming  •  44 5.4.4. Chords and Melodies  •  44 5.5. Comparisons to Other DAWs  •  44

PART II  CREATIVE ELECTRONIC MUSIC PROJECTS FOR THE MASSES  •  47 6 Designing Creative Music Projects  •  49 6.1. Working with Beginners  •  49 6.2. Philosophy •  50 6.3. Process Versus Product  •  51 6.4. Customization and Aesthetic Opportunities  •  53 6.5. Pacing •  53 6.6. Listening to and Observing Students  •  54 6.6.1. Techniques for Pop-​Cultural Ethnographic Observation  •  54 6.6.2. Tips for Incorporating a New Trend in Your Teaching  •  55 6.7. The Project Formula  •  56 6.8. Technical and Aesthetic Goals  •  57 6.9. Deconstructing a Genre  •  59 6.10. Universal Techniques  •  59 6.10.1. Provide Default Tracks and Presets  •  59 6.10.2. Add Variety Through MIDI Manipulation  •  59 6.10.3. Scenes as Form  •  59 6.10.4. Recording to Arrangement View  •  60 6.10.5. Eight-​bar Phrases  •  60 6.10.6. Song Structure  •  60 6.10.7. Fuzzy Boundaries and Fill Bars  •  60 6.10.8. Making Songs End Gracefully  •  60 6.11. The Prime Directive  •  60

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7 Teaching Recording and Sampling with Audio Projects  •  62

7.1. Designing Projects Centered on Audio  •  62 7.1.1. Play, Stop, Record  •  62 7.1.2. The Timeline  •  62 7.1.3. Recorded Audio  •  63 7.1.4. Basic Editing Skills  •  64 7.1.5. Loops •  66 7.1.6. Ableton Live’s Session View  •  67 7.1.7. Ableton Live’s Arrangement View  •  67 7.2. Project Example: Arranging Clips  •  69 7.2.1. Project Duration  •  69 7.2.2. Technical Goals  •  69 7.2.3. Creative Goals  •  69 7.2.4. Listening Examples  •  69 7.2.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  69 7.2.6. Project Design  •  70 7.2.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  70 7.2.8. Troubleshooting •  73 7.2.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  73 7.2.10. During Work Time  •  74 7.2.11. Assessment Strategies  •  74 7.3. Project Example: Unreliable Product Ad  •  74 7.3.1. Project Duration  •  74 7.3.2. Technical Goals  •  75 7.3.3. Creative Goals  •  75 7.3.4. Listening Examples  •  75 7.3.5. Materials Needed  •  75 7.3.6. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  75 7.3.7. Project Design  •  75 7.3.8. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  76 7.3.9. One-​Hour Version  •  78 7.3.10. Troubleshooting •  78 7.3.11. Differentiated Instruction  •  79 7.3.12. During Work Time  •  80 7.3.13. Assessment Strategies  •  80 7.3.14. The Comedy Pyramid  •  80 7.4. Project Example: Simple Remix  •  82 7.4.1. Project Duration  •  82 7.4.2. Technical Goals  •  82 7.4.3. Creative Goals  •  82 7.4.4. Listening Examples  •  82 7.4.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  82 7.4.6. Project Design  •  84 7.4.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  86 7.4.8. Troubleshooting •  88 7.4.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  89 7.4.10. During Work Time  •  89 7.4.11. Assessment Strategies  •  89 7.4.12. Making This Project Your Own  •  89

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7.5. Project Example: Picking Apart a Multitrack  •  90 7.5.1. Project Duration  •  90 7.5.2. Technical Goals  •  90 7.5.3. Creative Goals  •  90 7.5.4. Listening Examples  •  90 7.5.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  91 7.5.6. Project Design  •  92 7.5.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  93 7.5.8. Troubleshooting •  94 7.5.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  94 7.5.10. During Work Time  •  95 7.5.11. Assessment Strategies  •  95 7.5.12. Making This Project Your Own  •  95 7.6. Project Example: Custom Cover Song  •  96 7.6.1. Project Duration  •  96 7.6.2. Technical Goals  •  96 7.6.3. Creative Goals  •  96 7.6.4. Listening Examples  •  96 7.6.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  96 7.6.6. Overview of the Technique  •  97 7.6.7. Syncing the Guide Track Using Ableton Live  •  98 7.6.8. Cultural Considerations  •  100 7.7. Project Example: Movie Soundtrack  •  101 7.7.1. Project Duration  •  101 7.7.2. Technical Goals  •  101 7.7.3. Creative Goals  •  101 7.7.4. Examples •  102 7.7.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  102 7.7.6. Project Design  •  103 7.7.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  103 7.7.8. Troubleshooting •  107 7.7.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  109 7.7.10. During Work Time  •  110 7.7.11. Assessment Strategies  •  110 7.7.12. Making This Project Your Own  •  111

8 Teaching Songwriting with MIDI Projects  •  112

8.1. Software Instruments Versus MIDI  •  112 8.1.1. Drums Versus Not-​Drums, Step Time Versus Real Time  •  113 8.2. Functional Music Theory  •  114 8.3. Elements of Music  •  115 8.4. Sound Design  •  116 8.5. Genre Deconstruction  •  117 8.6. Project Example: Drum Programming  •  117 8.6.1. Project Duration  •  117 8.6.2. Technical Goals  •  117 8.6.3. Creative Goals  •  117 8.6.4. Listening Examples  •  118 8.6.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  118

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8.6.6. Project Design  •  118 8.6.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  118 8.6.8. Troubleshooting •  125 8.6.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  125 8.6.10. During Work Time  •  126 8.6.11. Assessment Strategies  •  126 8.7. Project Example: Beatmaking  •  127 8.7.1. Project Duration  •  127 8.7.2. Technical Goals  •  127 8.7.3. Creative Goals  •  127 8.7.4. Listening Examples  •  127 8.7.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  127 8.7.6. Project Design  •  128 8.7.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  129 8.7.8. Troubleshooting •  132 8.7.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  133 8.7.10. During Work Time  •  133 8.7.11. Assessment Strategies  •  133 8.8. Project Example: Slow Jam  •  134 8.8.1. Project Duration  •  134 8.8.2. Technical Goals  •  134 8.8.3. Creative Goals  •  134 8.8.4. Listening Examples  •  134 8.8.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  134 8.8.6. Project Design  •  135 8.8.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  136 8.8.8. Troubleshooting •  145 8.8.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  146 8.8.10. During Work Time  •  146 8.8.11. Assessment Strategies  •  146 8.9. Project Example: Future Bass  •  147 8.9.1. Project Duration  •  147 8.9.2. Technical Goals  •  147 8.9.3. Creative Goals  •  147 8.9.4. Listening Examples  •  147 8.9.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  148 8.9.6. Project Design  •  148 8.9.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  149 8.9.8. Troubleshooting •  156 8.9.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  157 8.9.10. During Work Time  •  157 8.9.11. Assessment Strategies  •  157 8.10. Project Example: House Music  •  158 8.10.1. Project Duration  •  158 8.10.2. Technical Goals  •  158 8.10.3. Creative Goals  •  158 8.10.4. Listening Examples  •  158 8.10.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  158 8.10.6. Project Design  •  158

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8.10.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  159 8.10.8. Troubleshooting •  164 8.10.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  165 8.10.10. During Work Time  •  166 8.10.11. Assessment Strategies  •  166 8.11. Project Example: Trap Beats  •  166 8.11.1. Project Duration  •  166 8.11.2. Technical Goals  •  166 8.11.3. Creative Goals  •  167 8.11.4. Listening Examples  •  167 8.11.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  167 8.11.6. Project Design  •  168 8.11.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  168 8.11.8. Troubleshooting •  171 8.11.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  173 8.11.10. During Work Time  •  173 8.11.11. Assessment Strategies  •  173

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9 Teaching Creativity with Outside-​the-​Box Projects  •  175 9.1. Designing Projects to Teach Originality  •  175 9.2. Irreverence •  176 9.3. Repurposing Ideas That Exist Already  •  177 9.4. Finding Your Voice  •  177 9.5. Project Example: Soundscape  •  178 9.5.1. Project Duration  •  178 9.5.2. Technical Goals  •  178 9.5.3. Creative Goals  •  178 9.5.4. Listening Examples  •  179 9.5.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  179 9.5.6. Project Design  •  179 9.5.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  179 9.5.8. Troubleshooting •  184 9.5.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  184 9.5.10. During Work Time  •  185 9.5.11. Assessment Strategies  •  185 9.6. Project Example: Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop  •  186 9.6.1. Project Duration  •  186 9.6.2. Technical Goals  •  186 9.6.3. Creative Goals  •  186 9.6.4. Listening Examples  •  186 9.6.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  186 9.6.6. Project Design  •  187 9.6.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  187 9.6.8. Troubleshooting •  193 9.6.9. Differentiated Instruction  •  193 9.6.10. During Work Time  •  193 9.6.11. Assessment Strategies  •  194 9.7. Project Example: Video Beatboxing  •  194 9.7.1. Project Duration  •  194 9.7.2. Technical Goals  •  194

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9.7.3. Creative Goals  •  195 9.7.4. Video Examples  •  195 9.7.5. Audio Examples of Found Sounds in the Drum Parts  •  195 9.7.6. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  195 9.7.7. Project Design  •  195 9.7.8. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  196 9.7.9. Troubleshooting •  199 9.7.10. Differentiated Instruction  •  200 9.7.11. During Work Time  •  200 9.7.12. Assessment Strategies  •  200 9.8. Project Example: Sampling  •  201 9.8.1. Project Duration  •  201 9.8.2. Technical Goals  •  201 9.8.3. Creative Goals  •  201 9.8.4. Listening Examples  •  201 9.8.5. Before Teaching This Lesson  •  202 9.8.6. A Crash Course in Musical Intellectual Property  •  202 9.8.7. Project Design  •  203 9.8.8. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  203 9.8.9. Troubleshooting •  208 9.8.10. Differentiated Instruction  •  209 9.8.11. During Work Time  •  210 9.8.12. Assessment Strategies  •  210 9.9. The Final Project  •  211 9.9.1. Project Duration  •  211 9.9.2. Goals •  211 9.9.3. Project Design  •  211 9.9.4. Day-​by-​Day Plan  •  212 9.9.5. Troubleshooting •  214 9.9.6. During Work Time  •  215 9.9.7. Assessment Strategies  •  215

10 Common Issues in Music Lab Lessons  •  217

10.1. Weak Student Engagement  •  217 10.2. Projects Take Too Long  •  217 10.2.1. Strategy One: Real Artists Ship  •  218 10.2.2. Strategy Two: More One-​on-​One Help  •  218 10.2.3. Strategy Three: Pencils Down  •  218 10.3. Projects End Too Quickly  •  218 10.4. Students Are Afraid to Show Their Projects  •  219 10.5. I Can’t Think of Ideas for Projects  •  220 10.6. Staying Relevant  •  220 10.7. I Went to School for Music. How (or Why) Should I Manage a Computer Class?  •  221 10.8. Students Are Trying Hard, But They Always Seem Lost  •  222

11 Assessing Music Lab Projects  •  223

11.1. Intrinsic Motivation  •  223 11.2. Critical Listening  •  224 11.3. Practical Considerations  •  224

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12 Future-​proofing the Electronic Music School  •  226

12.1. Refreshing Old Projects  •  226 12.1.1. Strategy 1: Update the Elements of a Project That Involves Choices  •  227 12.1.2. Strategy 2: Acknowledge Defeat and Make Fun of Your Past Self  •  227 12.2. Outlasting a Graduating Class  •  227 12.3. Maintaining Skills Between Old and New Projects  •  228 12.4. Adapting to New Teaching Formats  •  229 12.5. Committing to a Platform (or Not)  •  230

PART III  COMMUNITY MUSIC CULTURE AND EXTRACURRICULARS  •  233 13 Live Performing and Afterschool Groups  •  235

13.1. Preparing Students for a Musical Life Outside of School  •  235 13.2. Model One: Recording Club  •  235 13.3. Model Two: The House Band  •  236 13.4. Model Three: Electronic Music Group  •  237 13.4.1. The Birth of the Electronic Music Group  •  237 13.4.2. Equipment •  238 13.4.3. A Student Perspective on EMG  •  244 13.4.4. The Live Set  •  245

14 Understanding Student-​Led Groups  •  247

14.1. The Teacher’s Role (Hint: Very Different)  •  247 14.2. Remember the Prime Directive  •  248 14.3. Building Creative Teams  •  248 14.4. The Whiteboard Session  •  249 14.5. Giving and Taking Criticism  •  251 14.6. Refining Ideas Before They Get Made  •  253 14.7. Facilitating, or “What Can You Do That They Can’t?”  •  253 14.8. How Ideas from Student-​Led Groups Benefit Lab-​Based Courses  •  256 14.9. The Core Values  •  256 14.10. Going Beyond Music: Film, TV Shows, Other Content, and Media Production  •  256

15 Virtual Electronic Music School  •  260

15.1. Burn It All Down  •  260 15.2. Change Everything  •  260 15.3. Moving the Electronic Music School Online  •  261 15.3.1. Smaller Group or Individual Meetings  •  262 15.3.2. Synchronous Class Meeting That Breaks into Smaller Groups  •  262 15.3.3. Asynchronous Online Class  •  262 15.3.4. Live-​Streaming Sessions  •  263 15.4. Rebuilding •  264

16 A Rising Tide  •  265

16.1. Maximum Reach and Demographics  •  265 16.2. How Traditional Music Groups Thrive Because of Project-​Based Courses  •  266 16.3. A Performing Arts Program That Truly Elevates Culture  •  267 16.4. Critical Popular Music Studies  •  267

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16.5. Producing and Consuming Audio  •  268 16.6. Educational Goals and Social Impact  •  269 16.7. The Racial Politics of Music Education  •  269 16.8. Music Creation as Personal Development  •  270 16.9. Building for Musical Lifetimes  •  271

Index  •  275

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FOREWORD “There is no ought-​to-​know-​how, there is only the uncovering of ourselves when we sit at the polishing stone.” —​W. A. Matthieu Hey all! Let me share a story. I first learned the basics of music production from watching Tom Cosm and Mr. Bill Ableton Live tutorials on YouTube. The year was 2011, dubstep was big, everything was sidechained, FM synthesis reigned supreme, and I wanted more than anything in the world to figure out how to make my computer go WUB. Who didn’t? I was getting my master’s in jazz composition at the time, and so I also really wanted to figure out how to make jazz big bands go WUB, too. I showed some Skrillex to my mentor, the brilliant arranger/​composer Jim McNeely, and he replied with an enthusiastic, “Whoa, cool stuff, let’s figure this out!” We went on to work out some sick low trombone voicings that had a certain timbral crunchiness that really did sound like a WUB, and in that moment I felt that delirious joy of self-​discovery and confidence that comes from being able to express my truth through sound. This book is a practical guide to teaching that joy. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein have written this book with the philosophy that the music tech teacher’s job is to follow the Prime Directive of giving guidance and feedback in a way that doesn’t interfere with the creative intentions of their students, and ultimately letting the students express their truths through sound through self-​discovery. The “uncovering of ourselves as we sit at the polishing stone.” Will and Ethan are both long-​time popular music educators who are acutely aware of challenges facing both their fellow music educators and their music students, which have all culminated in Electronic Music School. It’s a book about teaching music with the empathetic embrace of students’ musical tastes and backgrounds. It’s also a book about how to embrace these tastes while at the same time setting the constraints and limitations necessary for creative work. It’s a book not only about teaching things like drum programming, MIDI sequencing, and working with Session View in Ableton Live, but also on how to teach the use of those tools in the creation of meaningful music that students are proud of. Ya know, getting people to make beats that . . . slap. Music students of all levels of experience and all backgrounds already have a deep lived experience in the music that they love. Since popular musical styles change so quickly, it’s the responsibility of the teacher to stay up to date and to keep their “ears to the street” to understand the same sonic language their students have internalized. Electronic Music School gives a blueprint on how to identify the genre “tropes” of the sonic language of the student body, and how to create projects based on novel musical expressions, whatever they may be in the future.

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Music is both deeply personal and a shared cultural experience, and a good teacher will share in that story with their students. Jim McNeely played in Stan Getz’s band for many years, but he also embraced the compositional aesthetic of Skrillex because he wanted to share in my story, as distant as it was from his own. Will and Ethan have written a book that I think will go a long way in helping teachers share in their student’s stories, whatever they might be, and wherever those students come from, through the craft of electronic music production. WUB WUB, everybody. WUB WUB. —​Adam Neely (YouTuber, bassist/​etc. of Sungazer, lover of music and learning)

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PREFACE: THE MUSIC CLASS AT THE END OF THE WORLD What would music education be if we had to start over? Imagine a world with no band, no choir, and no orchestra, a world without marching contests, solo festivals, or music theory. No formal music education at all. If we burnt it all down and started over, would we do it the same way? We would surely have music itself. Music is found in every world culture and is one of the first brain functions to develop in humans. The same evolutionary process that allows human hearing to sense the complex subtleties of language also demands musical stimulation. Humans think in music. Our routines have rhythm and our emotions have tone. So what would music education look like if we had to invent it from scratch? In a sense, we really must ask this question. As this book is being written, the coronavirus pandemic has forced school systems around the world to suspend large-​group gatherings, which has shut down much of the music education infrastructure. Nevertheless, technology has made it possible for students to create their own rich and engaging music, at school and at home. How should we teach in such a world? Will educators become walking instruction manuals for the latest software and hardware? How can we keep pace with the rapid evolution of popular styles and the technological tools used to create them? When Will was eight years old, his dad gave him a CD by The Art of Noise. The opening track, “Dan Dare,” sounded like nothing else he had heard before: a cluttered collage of noises, 1980’s drums, and orchestral loops. It put the feelings and emotions into its instrumental track, without any lyrics to distract from them. It was the first time he can remember really deeply thinking about music, and it was his first exposure to electronic music. Ethan remembers when “Pump Up the Volume” by M|A|R|R|S began playing on the radio in 1987—​the recording was a disorienting collage of sonic fragments over a futuristic soundscape. And both Will and Ethan were drawn to electronic artists like Daft Punk, The Prodigy, and The Chemical Brothers and to hip-​hop producers like The Bomb Squad and Pete Rock. They branched out into more experimental and ambient sounds like Squarepusher, Photek, Future Sound of London, and Aphex Twin. Few of their peers knew this music, but they could sense its urgent creativity. Will had no idea how to make electronic music when he got his degree in music education, and his college was of little help. He learned a great deal about clarinet fingerings, wind ensemble repertoire, conducting, writing marching band drill, Schenkerian reduction, counterpoint, sight singing, and Western art music history. He learned little about the process and culture of electronic music creation aside from music notation software. These omissions persist in many music education schools. Ethan spent a decade teaching himself production through trial and error, with information and guidance from friends, from magazines, and eventually, from the internet. He did not attend a formal music technology class until he entered New York University’s Music Technology Master’s Program in his thirties. The program taught him cutting-​edge signal processing and synthesis techniques, but not the pedagogy of electronic music

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creativity. When he began teaching music tech to music education students at NYU and elsewhere, he had to develop his curricula through the same trial-​and-​error process he had used to learn production. After a brief stint as a junior high band director, Will was offered the opportunity to pilot a music technology course at his high school. The first year, he learned along with the students. He vividly remembers watching GarageBand video tutorials with his classes in 2006. As he designed the lessons beyond the basics, he drew upon his past for inspiration. He remembered his Daft Punk albums with their four-​on-​the-​floor drum beats and thought, “I can teach drum programming with this.” He remembered the chopped up vinyl samples from DJ Shadow’s Endtroducing . . . (1996) and thought,“I could teach sampling with this!” He remembered the distorted haze of ISDN by Future Sound of London (1994) and thought, “We could make abstract soundscapes like this!” The authors realize now that they had stumbled upon a new frontier in music education. Teaching students how to make “noncanonical” music that may or may not become historically relevant proved to be both controversial with the authors’ peers in music education and highly appealing to their students. The authors were unsure how to articulate it, but they felt like they were onto something profound. They shared the students’ excitement as they struggled to recreate the music they loved and to invent their own new sounds. And, in the same way that they had learned to make their own electronic music in their bedrooms, the authors experienced a similar thrill from inventing a new pedagogy. The challenge and the fun have been to continually rework and refine the approach in response to the students’ needs and ideas. Over the past several years, Will and Ethan have developed and refined systems that work well for them in the training and programming of creative electronic music curricula. Their continual goal has been to offer authentic experiences in making electronic and pop music for their students. If the pedagogical advice given in this book seems anecdotal or specific to their situation, it is. Just as they have had to make it up as they went along, so will you have to adapt methods to your own musical journey. The authors have observed many fine music technology programs across the United States that focus on hip-​hop, rock, and even formal classical styles, all of which have created a creative feedback loop with their students. Will and Ethan choose to teach music technology through popular and dance styles because these styles feel most authentically native to the medium. They do this for the same reason that piano teachers use Beethoven, that wind bands use Sousa marches, and that choirs use gospel songs. Samplers “want” to create collage-​like techno and hip-​ hop. The TB-​303 “wants” to make Acid House. The TR-​808 “wants” to make trap beats. Ableton Live “wants” to make nonlinear semi-​improvised music. These tools are rarely taught in music degree programs. As the authors began institutionalizing these wild and amateur-​driven creative forms, they wanted to preserve the sense of play and discovery that the early house and rap producers felt. This is not just an ideological stance; since many students have no previous musical experience, a sense of discovery is a practical necessity as well. The story of music technology is a story of musicians finding unexpected uses for the tools at hand, like Tom Hanks in Cast Away (2000). Furthermore, many of the technological tools of music were invented and devised not by musicians, but by engineers. For example, pitch-​correction software evolved from tools originally designed for finding oil

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underground and for encrypting military communications. And music tools don’t always get used for their intended purpose. When Roland developed the TB-​303, they thought they were making a rehearsal and songwriting aid, not the basis for a surreal new dance music. Musical styles and technologies are always changing, but the process of decoding and adapting tools to our needs and environment is natural to humans. Thanks to the Covid pandemic, our profession finds itself on a desert island, and we must make the best of the tools at hand. We are all improvising our way through this together. The authors hope that this book helps to make your improvisation easier, and more fun. —​Will and Ethan

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS From Will Kuhn: This book represents a great deal of my work from the past 15 years at Lebanon High School in Lebanon, Ohio, none of which would have been possible without my students. I give my deepest thanks to all of my students over the years who trusted me enough to come along on this journey. A special thanks to all of the Electronic Music Group students who have helped change the world of music education, and who inspire me daily with their never-​ending supply of creative ideas. It has been an honor getting to work with all of you. Of course, I also thank my adult colleagues at Lebanon City Schools, who gave me the freedom to create something truly new. To my colleague members of TI:ME (Technology in Music Education), thank you for providing support to me and so many others who have have started their own music technology programs. You made me feel welcome and connected when I thought I was the only one out there teaching this way. A special thanks to TI:ME executive director Mike Lawson for keeping the torch alight for music tech education all of these years, and to Barbara Freedman for accepting me as a peer even though she really didn’t need to. This book would not be possible without the help of all my friends at Ableton. Thank you for your support and guidance over the years. The deep conversations we have had about educational philosophy have given a great deal of depth and meaning to the experience of hundreds of my students each year. Thanks to Leonard Boehm, Dennis DeSantis, Dennis Fischer, Ben Casey, and so many more for mentoring me through this project, and for helping bring music education to so many young people in need. Thank you to Billie Eilish for giving my teenage daughter and me lots to talk about regarding music production as this book was being written. Thank you to director Rian Johnson for making polished movies that inspire me to finish my own work. Discussing the finer points of The Last Jedi with my son helped me see that “the greatest teacher, failure is” (a helpful lesson during the proposal stage of this book). Thank you to Ramona Xavier (Vektroid/​Macintosh Plus) for creative tips found in Chapter 9, and thank you to Jason Theodor for his gracious contributions and insights on creativity found in Chapter 14. Thank you to Josh Chal for mentoring me through my first semester at University of Cincinnati College-​Conservatory of Music (CCM) and for reminding me to slow down and to take a deep breath every once in a while. Thank you to David Iannelli and Andrew Sersion for keeping my classes alive during the pandemic. Thank you to our editor Norm Hirschy, for seeking out and sharpening this project with steel, and to V. J. Manzo, who helped me during the very early stages of this project and is a constant source of camaraderie and inspiration. Of course, thank you to Ethan Hein for being the chillest co-​author a guy could ask for and a relentless editor of my sloppy writing. I am so grateful that you decided to take on this project with me.

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Acknowledgments

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To the most important people in my life, my family: Jen, Annelise, and Ethan—​thank you for the sacrifices you all made to help me write this book. I promise it will have been worth it. Finally, thank you to my father Bill Kuhn, who passed away in late 2019. He is the person most responsible for my love of electronic music, and the one who taught me how to thrive outside of the box. I wish you could see the finished product. From Ethan Hein: Thank you to NYU Steinhardt’s Music Education program, the John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University, and the Contemporary Music Department at the New School’s Eugene Lang College, where I developed and refined many of the ideas and approaches in this book. Thanks especially to all the students that I’ve had the privilege of teaching at these fine institutions—​I’ve learned at least as much from you as you have from me. Thank you to Alex Ruthmann, John Gilbert, Adam Bell, David Elliott, Colleen Larson, Ken Aigen, Luke Dubois, Paul Geluso, Matt Thibeault, Toni Blackman, Martin Urbach, Brandon Bennett, and Jamie Ehrenfeld for all of your teaching mentorship and inspiration. Thank you to Alex Ruthmann, Kevin Irlen, Matthew Kaney, Diana Castro, Adam November, Marijke Jorritsma, Sumanth Srinivasan, Willie Payne, and everyone else at the NYU Music Experience Design Lab who helped to make the Groove Pizza a reality. Thank you to Dennis DeSantis, Jack Schaedler, and all the other folks at Ableton for making such excellent music creation and teaching tools. Thank you Will for being the coolest music teacher in America, and for inviting me along on this ride. And above all, thanks to Anna, Milo, and Bernadetta, for whom I do all of this.

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS Will Kuhn serves as instructor of music technology at the University of Cincinnati College-​ Conservatory of Music and as Music Department Coordinator at Lebanon High School in Lebanon, Ohio. He is also an Ableton Certified Trainer. In 2006, he designed an innovative high school music tech curriculum focused on amateur music production that involves over 300 students annually. His lab-​based courses and student projects are regularly featured at regional music education events. He was named TI:ME (Technology in Music Education) Teacher of the Year in 2015, and currently he serves as the organization’s national president. Interactive Composition: Strategies Using Ableton Live and Max for Live (by V. J. Manzo and Will Kuhn) is widely used by producers and instructors who are working to incorporate Max for Live into electronic music styles. Nationally, he gives clinics and workshops on revitalizing school music programs for the 21st century. Ethan Hein is a Doctoral Fellow in Music Education at New York University and an adjunct professor at NYU and The New School. As a founding member of the NYU Music Experience Design Lab (musedlab.org), Ethan has led the development of various technologies for music learning and expression, most notably the Groove Pizza. He maintains an influential blog (ethanhein.com), and he has written for publications like NewMusicBox, Slate, and Quartz. He leads professional development sessions for schools across the United States on music technology, creativity, and decolonizing the curriculum, and his writing is assigned in college syllabi around the world.

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TO THE READER If you are reading this book, we assume you are a music educator of some kind. Maybe you went to a conservatory and studied classical music like Will, or maybe you self-​taught in the wilds of pop and rock like Ethan. Maybe you teach in a school, in a community organization, or in a private studio. Maybe you are the leader of a nonprofit that brings music production lessons to urban schools, or maybe you’re a band director looking to replace a boring music history class with something new. Or maybe you are just teaching yourself and your friends. We have met hundreds of educators of different backgrounds and experiences at our schools, at conferences, and online. We think of them in two broad categories: public school music teachers and independent music teachers. We address each group in turn.

To Public School Teachers Like Will, you probably obtained your bachelor’s degree in music education. You were probably drawn to the profession by your success in a performing group like band or orchestra. Perhaps you teach general music classes, or perhaps you identify as a “director” of some kind. Either way, your experience in college and public teaching prepared you to rehearse and to perform with a large ensemble, or to lecture as an expert in a music theory or history class at the secondary level. You also probably have some experience with elementary general music. And you may currently be well outside your comfort zone. If you are looking to start a music tech program, you will face the challenge of serving a different population of students than you are used to. Music tech classes are diverse, unruly, and unpredictable compared to your top band or select choir. You will have self-​ identified nonmusicians alongside “alternative” musicians like DJs, beatmakers, and singer-​songwriters, and they will vary widely in their knowledge and experience. The nonmusicians in particular will be taking a personal risk by signing up for a music class, and they will need lots of encouragement and a feeling of safety. If you can find a way to connect with all the members of this motley crew, you can provide a great creative experience for each of them. Even if you are not familiar with every style or genre your students are interested in, your deep musical background has given you the tools to figure it out, and to provide insights they would not be able to find elsewhere.

To Independent Music Teachers Like Ethan, you may not have an undergrad degree in music education, or in any music-​ related field. You probably don’t see your students every day for a full class period. You are likely to be working with a limited set of equipment, with uncertain funding, and with chaotic attendance. On the upside, you are probably an artist yourself, and students find you relatable and credible. Public school music teachers struggle to attain the cultural legitimacy that you possess effortlessly. Your circumstances may not permit full-​fledged versions of all the projects in this book, so we encourage you to pick and choose. The

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lesson plans we give here assume continuity between sessions, with lots of face-​to-​face time, so they are long and complex, but you can simplify, compress, and adapt them. For example, Ethan teaches in colleges, so his class time is limited, but he can expect students to do more independent work outside of class. Equipment is always a challenge for any tech-​based course. Unlike public school teachers, private and community educators must often buy gear or fundraise for themselves. The good news is that it is not necessary to have any particular equipment beyond computers and headphones to do most of these projects. The equipment list we present is a best-​case scenario, not a bare minimum. Most private artist/​educators do not have public teaching licensure. If you can, we encourage you to obtain licensure or some other credential. The music education profession presents obstacles to nonclassical musicians, but the obstacles can be overcome, and schools need your skills and outlook.

To Everyone Music education needs fresh ideas, and as a revolutionary educator, you are in a place to supply them. The fact that you are reading this book means you want to bring fresh experiences to your students and that you are not afraid to challenge the status quo. One may need a great deal of courage for to decide to give up band classes and to teach music technology full time, just as one needs courage to try to break into academia later in life. The authors found these risks to be well worth taking, but it was worth even more to the thousands of students we have had the privilege of teaching. Some of them have gone on to further study and professional careers in electronic media production and creative music-​making. We wish you the best of luck as you begin your own path toward making your own electronic music school.

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PART I

What You Need to Start Your Own Electronic Music School This section inventories what every teacher needs to do before launching a music technology program. It is not intended to be an exhaustive guide; instead, it lists the lessons derived from experiences launching a successful program and from observing the experiences of others. The first chapters lay the philosophical and cultural groundwork for popular music production, as well as the behind-​the-​scenes process of pitching ideas for a music technology offering to school administrators, including working with the guidance department and presenting the new class to curriculum leaders. The last two chapters cover the hardware and tech needed for a heavy-​use lab setting, the process of designing a functional creative space for students to make music and media, and the rationale, setup, and techniques for Ableton Live and Push, as well as how they compare to other digital audio workstations.

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Toward a Creative Music Curriculum

Digital audio production gives us an unprecedented opportunity to support students in active, culturally authentic music-​making, regardless of their level of preexisting ability. But to realize this revolutionary potential, educators need to reorient their approach. A successful music technology program requires a change from the teacher-​led ensemble model to a creative workshop structure more closely resembling an art class. The challenge in teaching music technology is not the technology itself. The challenge is to foster student creativity. To do that, educators will need to develop their own pedagogical creativity, the ability “to stimulate curiosity and [to find] one’s own teaching style to promote creativity, as no prescribed formula appears to work for everybody” (Odena 2012, pp. 524–​525). While this prospect may be daunting, ideally it will also be liberating.

1.1. The Creative Music Teacher Why is it so important to promote student and teacher creativity? We believe that this is the best way to address the “crisis of irrelevancy” (Reimer, 2009, p. 301) confronting music education in the United States. Only 20% of high school students participate in elective ensemble-​based music when it is available to them, and that number is in a steady decline (Abril, 2014). It is easy to blame budget cuts for shrinking enrollment in school music, but they are not the only explanation (Kratus, 2007). Students’ opting out of school music programs is a major factor, and it is the one that educators can control. While funding will always be a limitation, educators can design programs to make them more appealing and relevant to more students. A thriving, well-​attended program is less likely to be cut. Jo Saunders (2010) described the phenomenon of students who don’t participate in or identify with school music, but who nevertheless consider themselves to be musicians. (The second author of this book, Ethan Hein, falls into this group, as do most popular musicians.) These students are the ones who are the most obvious candidates for recruitment into school music programs. How can they be brought into the fold? The solution is not necessarily to add more “popular” music to the ensemble repertoire. “Until recently, popular music’s presence in the classroom has been restricted to a change of curriculum content. In developing this new content, we have focused mainly on the music itself—​ the product—​and have largely failed to notice the processes by which this product is transmitted in the world outside the school” (Green, 2006). Nonparticipant musicians Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0001

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may not be reacting to the repertoire, but to the teacher-​led ensemble model itself. Such students want to make their own music in a setting that is more self-​directed. Music technology creates unprecedented opportunities to support this activity. New technologies “do not simply enhance preexisting practices of cultural production and consumption; they help to undermine the producer/​consumer dichotomy itself” (Sinnreich, 2010, p. 75, emphasis in original). A student who has made a playlist in iTunes or Spotify has already experienced a form of musical creativity. “The user’s playlist itself becomes a kind of digital composition. The DJ becomes a superlistener and a musician. The ‘mash-​up’ and the remix constantly explore a plurality of unexpected associations. The studio engineer becomes the ‘producer’ who actually makes the music” (Hugill, 2012, pp. 225–​226, emphasis in original). There is a smooth continuum from sequencing entire songs to sequencing loops, to sequencing individual notes and drum hits. The legendary producer Brian Eno (2004) observed that the recording studio is a creative medium unto itself, one with different requirements for musicality from composition or performance. No “composing” or “performing” has to ever take place in modern studio practice. Eno himself is a case in point—​while he has produced a string of famous and revered recordings, he does not consider himself to be adept at any instrument, and, like a lot of pop musicians, he is unable read or write notation. We need a new word to describe musicians like Eno. The digital studio has collapsed the distinction between musicians, composers, and engineers (Bell, 2014), and the word “producer” seems apt for creators working across traditional role boundaries. In the analog recording era, producers were people like Quincy Jones, executive managers of a commercial process. However, today, a producer is anyone who creates recorded music in any capacity. Producers write songs, program beats, sequence MIDI, play instruments, run recording sessions, and edit and mix audio. Producing is a category of behavior, not a category of person. A producer creates, using whatever medium, in whatever style. The authors’ music teaching philosophy is based on constructivism, the idea that music education will be most engaging and meaningful when the teaching strategies support students’ agency in their own learning (Brennan, 2013). Agency, in this sense, refers to students’ ability to define and pursue their own learning goals, so that they can play a part in their own self-​development, adaptation, and self-​renewal. Learner agency may appear to be incompatible with a structured learning environment, but, ideally, structures should be created to support learner agency. Constructivist educators can “leverage technology in support of active, social music making that emphasizes the doing of music, rather than solely focusing on learning about music” (Ruthmann, 2012, p. 178, emphases in original). In other words, music classrooms can become a place to produce producers. The psychological benefits of music creation extend beyond musical learning. Producing music is an opportunity to practice craftsmanship,1 the desire to do a job well for its own sake. Craftsmanship is a habit of mind that “serves the computer programmer, the doctor, and the artist; parenting improves when it is practiced as a skilled craft, as does citizenship” (Sennett, 2008, p. 9). Musical performers exercise craftsmanship as well, but not along as many different dimensions as producers do. Before asking what types of music should be taught and how they should be taught, it’s worth asking a deeper question: Why teach music at all? People enjoy music, but there 1 This term contains sexist bias, but the authors can’t think of a better one.

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Toward a Creative Music Curriculum

are plenty of other activities they enjoy that aren’t offered in school. What makes music so special? Steve Dillon (2007) argued that music is valuable because it’s an effective way to enact flow states. Mihály Csíkszentmihályi (2008) listed the elements of flow: immediate feedback contributing to a balance between skill and challenge; merged action and awareness, completely occupying one’s attention; deep, sustained concentration; control of the situation, as well as the freedom to generate possibilities; and loss of self-​ consciousness. In a teacher-​directed ensemble, students may not be able to control their own experience to attain flow. If an activity’s challenge level is beyond their ability level, students experience anxiety. If their ability level exceeds the challenge, students experience boredom. Flow happens when challenge and ability are well balanced. Student-​led creativity is highly congenial to flow. In a flow-​centric view of music education, there is more at stake for educators than just providing people pleasure. Flow is a matter of public health, “a powerful weapon against depression” (Dillon, 2007, p. 48). Music-​induced flow unifies the individual with the social. It draws out troubled and antisocial young people and helps them integrate into the group. It gives voice to those who might find it difficult to express themselves otherwise. Flow is good for the body, too, although exactly how it supports physical well-​ being is not yet understood. Still, the field of music therapy shows that music-​induced flow has powerful health benefits. People with a self-​motivated “autotelic” personality type have a predisposition to flow, an ability to seek and construct their own challenges. While some people may be lucky enough to have been born with this kind of self-​motivation, it’s also a trait that can be learned—​and taught. Autotelic people are better equipped for positive thinking and resilience. Studying music can help develop those qualities, because flow experiences encourage autotelicism, a state that self-​reinforces through pleasure. When people learn the ability to take satisfaction from self-​challenge in a musical context, that ability becomes a tool they can carry into any other context. The challenge, then, is to create the most diverse opportunities to practice autotelicism through creative work.

1.2. Addressing Students Who Typically Don’t Take Music Classes (The Other Eighty Percent) Teenagers who don’t care about music are rare, so why do so few students want to enroll in school music programs? Becoming a performer of composed music is only one way to be a musician, and it’s not the one that aligns with the tastes, identities, and aspirations of most kids. Researchers have noticed that when students compose “in their own style,” the results almost always sound like popular music (Rodriguez, 2004, pp. 20–​21). If school music programs afford students the opportunity to become good musicians according to their own standards, to reach their own musical aspirations, and to experience the empowering feeling of self-​efficacy, it stands to reason that students will be likelier to want to participate (Randles, 2011). This is not just a matter of “giving the kids what they want;” it’s a matter of shaping their self-​identity as musicians. The authors often hear objections to the idea of teaching pop music production. Sure, pop music is accessible and relatively easy, but why should we consider the disposable ephemera of commercial culture to be worthy of serious study? One answer is to say that pop music varies in its quality from banal to sublime, just like any other kind

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of music. But we think it’s worth paying attention even to pop fluff. Being a producer requires critical listening, and there is a lot of value in approaching mainstream culture from a critical stance. The ability to claim creative ownership over pop culture is an empowering sensation, especially for young people who may not feel much empowerment otherwise. What is lost by not teaching contemporary production techniques? Excluding entire categories of music and musicianship from the official curriculum sends powerful and lasting messages to students (and everyone else) about what society values and what it does not (Bledsoe, 2015). By simply teaching the established curriculum and affirming the truth of “good music,” educators run the risk of challenging the legitimacy of students’ deeply felt musical experiences and identities. Whatever their personal tastes, kids form their judgments of musical worth against the “official” music of school (Saunders, 2010, p. 74). Many excellent artists don’t consider themselves to be “real musicians” because they “failed” at school music. Invalidating students’ musical identities feels like a threat (Cavicchi, 2009), and the stigma of “failure” is a heavy psychological burden to overcome. Musicianship is fundamentally something that can be taught. Even congenital amusia (“tone deafness”) can probably be overcome by learning. Therefore, music education should not be only for the “talented.” If talent were truly innate, there wouldn’t be much point in offering music education for everybody. The notion of talent can be used to restrict access to music to the kids who are already good at it. If, on the contrary, musicianship is seen as a matter of learned expertise rather than innate talent, then the educational culture should value effort and skill acquisition. Everyone is born with musical cognitive abilities, but those abilities have to be activated by learning. It’s the same with language; nearly everyone has the capacity to speak, but learning how to do it doesn’t happen automatically, it has to be nurtured. Music teachers face two conflicting goals. On the one hand, they want to maximize the number of participants. On the other hand, they also want to maximize the sound quality and individual virtuosity of student performers. Unfortunately, the two goals are contradictory. One goal prioritizes inclusion regardless of skill level, while the other prioritizes exclusion of all but the most adept. Very different pedagogical strategies apply to each goal. “Music teachers too often regard themselves more as agents for the discovery and selection of talented potential professionals than as agents for the development of the musicality that lies within each child” (Small, 1998, p. 212). Conservatories that produce professional musicians need to be competitive, but not all school music programs need to be modeled on conservatories. When school ensembles compete like sports teams, program leaders feel an incentive to identify the most talented musicians, but that necessarily forces exclusion of everyone else. In this context, excellence can only exist as a contrast to mediocrity and failure. Music educators’ “systematic reliance on high-​stakes competition” (Regelski, 2016, p. 28) aligns them with schools’ broader fixation on testing. Imagine if math classes were run the way ensembles are run. Teachers would identify the most “talented” mathematicians, would dedicate all of their resources to them, and wouldn’t bother with the rest. But this isn’t what happens, because schools at least try to teach everyone math. The efforts to support struggling math learners may be inadequate or even counterproductive, but at least low performers are not excluded from studying math entirely. “Some music teachers appear to exhibit the attitude of a physician who complains that all the patients in the

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Toward a Creative Music Curriculum

waiting room are sick! In other words, they prefer to work only with the talented, ‘musically healthy’ few, when it is those who are in the most need of intervention who deserve at least equal attention” (Regelski, 2009, p. 32). If music teachers hold themselves to the standards of teachers of academic subjects, then they have a responsibility to diversify their offerings and approaches to support more kinds of musicianship. A truism of music education advocacy is that playing an instrument builds kids’ self-​confidence (e.g., NAfME, 2014), but music education experiences can undermine students’ confidence as well, by making them feel incompetent and unmusical (Ruddock & Leong, 2005). If students’ preferred music is unavailable, or, worse yet, actively disparaged, their creative self-​efficacy is undermined. “The absence of [personal] relevance in music is perceived by students as implicit affirmation that they lack musical talent. . . . Unsuccessful students assume the problem is theirs, and they may begin a lifetime of music education avoidance” (Myers, 2008, p. 4). It’s hard enough for students who have the privilege of belonging to the school’s racial, ethnic, and class majorities to have their selfhood invalidated in the music classroom. For minority students, music class is particularly likely to be just one more instance of cultural “humiliation and alienation” (Valenzuela, 1999, p. 99). Including more forms of musicianship fosters a feeling of “cultural empowerment” (Reimer, 2009, p. 400), as more students become able to partake of the benefits of their culture, and to contribute something in return.

1.3. How Music Technology Can Fit into a Broader Performing Arts Curriculum Historically, it has been rare for children to create their own music in school. There are straightforward practical reasons for this. You have to be a very good instrumentalist before you can improvise well, and you have to master notation before you can do pencil and paper composition. But in the era of digital audio production, meaningful musical creativity has never been more accessible. A student can learn to create good-​sounding music with a computer in a matter of hours, rather than months or years. The instrumental backing track for “Pride” on Kendrick Lamar’s Pulitzer Prize-​winning album DAMN (2017) was produced by an 18-​year-​old on his iPhone. It makes us wonder what other creative possibilities there are in the devices students carry in their pockets and backpacks. Teaching music technology has larger benefits than simply attracting more bodies to the music program. The ethos of production can enrich and strengthen traditional music pedagogy as well. Students who learn to listen actively and critically to recordings can use that same skill to listen in ensembles. They can create music electronically and then arrange it for instruments and perform it live. They can record and remix performances. They build broader cultural literacy (Tobias, 2013, p. 228), and if they are headed for professional careers, they build necessary skills. Performing on a recording is different in the digital world than it was in the analog one. It’s a collaboration between many creative and technical people that feels more like animating a Pixar movie than filming a stage play (Halle, 2004). Notes on the page are rarely involved in the process. It’s more important for performers to be able to improvise, to learn by ear, and to consider how they blend in sonically. Musicians who know how to think like producers will do best at providing producers with what they need (Théberge, 1997, p. 241). Thanks to the affordances of digital audio editing, a top-​to-​bottom perfect performance is less necessary than a strong

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and confident one. A producer can easily edit out imperfections and errors, but they can not compensate for a lack of creativity or confidence. Electronic production also has unexpected benefits for traditional instrumental pedagogy. Software is ideally suited to producing endless repetition in support of rehearsal. The key to effective music learning is “chunking,” breaking a long piece into short, tractable segments and then building those segments into larger meta-​segments (Snyder, 2000). Electronic dance music is built from loops of such chunks. Any music can be broken into dance-​music-​style loops, and then students can practice the loops in tempo. Then the loops can be grouped into meta-​loops, without ever disrupting the underlying rhythmic groove. As is discussed below, Ableton Live an ideal tool for chunking and looping recordings and MIDI. Kirt Saville (2011) cited the music educator’s truism that “accurate feedback may be the single greatest variable for improving learning.” The longer the delay between the performance and the feedback, the less effective it is. Digital loop playback enables feedback in the moment, while the loop runs, so students don’t have to lose the flow. Rehearsing manageably sized loops sustained by a steady groove can turn potentially tedious drills into a satisfying and even joyous experience of actual music-​making. The simplest introductory exercise can have a groove if the right beat is thrown under it.

1.4. The Divide Between Music Teachers’ Definition of Music and Students’ Definition of Music Creating contemporary popular music is not just a matter of learning its rhythmic, melodic, and harmonic practices. Nor is it just a matter of learning software. Current pop and dance styles have their own aesthetic principles that can be challenging for schooled musicians to adapt to. As Paul Théberge (1997) argued, “The digitization of music is essentially a story of values, not inventions” (p. 215). These values are dramatically different from the values of the European conservatory. Music educators teach what they learned, and what they learned is likely to have been the conservatory-​style large ensemble (Williams, 2011). However, as is discussed above, only a minority of students form their musical identities around “school music”—​although music teachers tend to self-​select from within this minority. John Finney (2007) described music educators and their students as following different musical codes. “Teachers tend to use elaborated codes derived from Western European ‘elite’ culture, whereas students use vernacular codes. . . . Students and teachers are therefore in danger of standing on opposite sides of a musical and linguistic chasm with few holding the key to unlock the other’s code” (p. 18). The most important vernacular codes have nothing to do with technology, but with music itself. For example, nearly all pop styles are organized around a strong metronomic beat, while classical music rarely is. “It is the beat that draws the dividing line between serious and vernacular, visceral and intellectual” (Neill, 2002, p. 3). The Western classical tradition is based on the metaphor of the linear narrative, but electronic dance and pop music are based on the metaphor of the endless loop. Copy and paste is the defining gesture of digital editing tools, and infinitely looping playback is their signature sound (Butler, 2014). The cyclic nature of pop, dance, and hip-​hop music unites their many styles and subgenres. Loop-​centrism is increasingly common in contemporary “art” music, too. Susan McClary (2004) argued that the music of Missy Elliott, Steve Reich, and John Adams is fundamentally more similar than different, because their work all features similar cyclic structures.

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Aside from the beat, the main thing that unites all contemporary popular music is the fact that it exists mainly in recorded form. For a person living in a modern industrial society, nearly all musical experience happens via recordings. Current pop genres involve very little real-​time performance in their creation. This is a “post-​performance” age (Thibeault, 2010). Most current pop styles are, like disco, “a producer’s medium” (Moorefield, 2005, p. 90). Pop and dance music have co-​evolved with music technology, and shifts in one drive shifts in the other. New technologies don’t determine the course of pop music; they develop within an existing cultural context, “a context with its own needs, aesthetics, production practices, and modes of listening” (Théberge, 1997, pp. 172–​173). Dance music demands extreme rhythmic precision, extended repetitive forms, minimalist harmony, and wildly surreal timbres. It is possible to make this music with instruments, as disco producers did in the 1970s, but it is much easier to do with a computer. Popular music is hard to institutionalize because it has no stable models of excellence. For example, there is no single ideal “pop voice” the way that there is an ideal classical bel canto voice (Rodriguez, 2004, p. 22). Pop music has embraced singers as different from each other (and from the classical norm) as Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong, Howlin’ Wolf, Nina Simone, Tom Waits, Biz Markie, Björk, PJ Harvey, David Byrne, and Drake. The ever-​shifting definition of “good music” in popular culture may be seen as an obstacle. With fashions changing so fast, it’s hard to know whether students will respond as well to an activity this year as they did last year. However, the broad stylistic diversity of popular music also invites a broader variety of musical methods and approaches. A central tenet of constructivist pedagogy is that learning is most effective when it takes place within the “zone of proximal development” (Vygotsky, 1978, p. 86), when new concepts and experiences relate directly to the learner’s understanding of existing concepts and prior experience. Learners create meaning by making connections to understandings that they already have. If they have no frame of reference to draw on, then new information and experience may be meaningless. Students bring a deep implicit knowledge of popular music with them into the classroom. For that reason, pop music practice is ill suited to the traditional model “in which the teacher is the master of a body of facts, the whole operation being directed by him” (Vulliamy & Lee, 1976, p. 2). Students already understand their music well, even if they lack the tools to articulate their understanding. Music teachers bring something different to the table: knowledge of other kinds of music and the analytic tools and vocabulary to explain them. When music teachers apply their skills to helping students expand their knowledge of the music they are passionate about, then the students respond enthusiastically. Constructivist methodology doesn’t require the teacher to be a subject matter expert. Learning alongside students is an excellent teaching method, provided that the teacher exercises openness, curiosity, and vulnerability as a learner.

References Abril, C. (2014). Invoking an innovative spirit in music teacher education. In M. Kaschub & J. Smith (Eds.), Promising practices in 21st century music teacher education. Oxford University Press. Bell, A. P. (2014). Trial-​by-​fire: A case study of the musician–​engineer hybrid role in the home studio. Journal of Music, Technology & Education, 7(3), 295–​312.

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Bledsoe, R. (2015). Music education for all? General Music Today, 28(2), 18–​22.

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Brennan, K. (2013). Best of both worlds: Issues of structure and agency in computational creation, in and out of school (Doctoral dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology). Butler, M. (2014). Playing with something that runs: Technology, improvisation, and composition in DJ and laptop performance. Oxford University Press. Cavicchi, D. (2009). My music, their music, and the irrelevance of music education. In T. A. Regelski & J. T. Gates (Eds.), Music education for changing times (pp. 97–​107). Springer Science+Business Media. Csíkszentmihályi, M. (2008). Flow: the psychology of optimal experience. Harper Perennial Modern Classics. Dillon, S. (2007). Music, meaning and transformation: Meaningful music making for life. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Eno, B. (2004). The studio as compositional tool. In C. Cox & D. Warner (Eds.), Audio culture: Readings in modern music (pp. 127–​130). Continuum International Publishing Group. Finney, J. (2007). Music education as identity project in a world of electronic desires. In J. Finney & P. Burnard (Eds.), Music education with digital technology. Bloomsbury Academic. Green, L. (2006). Popular music education in and for itself, and for ‘other’ music: Current research in the classroom. International Journal of Music Education, 24(2), 101–​118. Halle, J. (2004). Meditations on a post-​ literate musical future. nmbx.newmusicusa.org/​ Meditations-​on-​a-​PostLiterate-​Musical-​Future/​ Hugill, A. (2012). The digital musician (2nd ed.). Routledge. Kratus, J. (2007). Music education at the tipping point. Music Educators Journal, 94(2), 42–​48. McClary, S. (2004). Rap, minimalism, and structures of time in late twentieth-​century culture. In D. Warner (Ed.), Audio culture: Readings in modern music (pp. 289–​298). Continuum International Publishing Group. Moorefield, V. (2005). The producer as composer: Shaping the sounds of popular music. MIT Press. Myers, D. E. (2008). Lifespan engagement and the question of relevance: Challenges for music education research in the twenty-​first century. Music Education Research, 10(1), 1–​14. NAfME. (2014). 20 important benefits of music 20-​important-​benefits-​of-​music-​in-​our-​schools/​

in

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schools.

nafme.org/​

Neill, B. (2002). Pleasure beats: Rhythm and the aesthetics of current electronic music. Leonardo Music Journal, 12(May), 3–​6. Odena, O. (2012). Creativity in the secondary music classroom. In G. McPherson & G. Welch (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of music education (Vol. 1, 1st ed., pp. 512–​528). Oxford University Press. Randles, C. (2011). “What is a good musician?” An analysis of student beliefs. Arts Education Policy Review, 112(1), 1–​8. Regelski, T. (2009). The ethics of music teaching as profession and praxis. Visions of Research in Music Education, 13(2009), 1–​34. Regelski, T. (2016). Music, music education, and institutional ideology: A praxial philosophy of musical sociality. Action, Criticism & Theory for Music Education, 15(2), 10–​45. Reimer, B. (2009). Seeking the significance of music education: Essays and reflections. R&L Education. Rodriguez, C. X. (2004). Popular music in music education: Toward a new conception of musicality. In C. X. Rodriguez (Ed.), Bridging the gap: Popular music and music education (pp. 13–​27). MENC: The National Association for Music Education.

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Ruddock, E., & Leong, S. (2005). “I am unmusical!”: The verdict of self-​judgement. International Journal of Music Education, 23(1), 9–​22. Ruthmann, A. (2012). Engaging adolescents with music and technology. In S. Burton (Ed.), Engaging musical practices: A sourcebook for middle school general music (pp. 176–​191). Rowman & Littlefield Education. Saunders, J. A. (2010). Identity in music: Adolescents and the music classroom. Action, Criticism & Theory for Music Education, 9(2), 70–​78. Saville, K. (2011). Strategies for using repetition as a powerful teaching tool. Music Educators Journal, 98(1), 69–​75. Sennett, R. (2008). Craftsmen. Yale University Press. Sinnreich, A. (2010). Mashed up: Music, technology, and the rise of configurable culture. University of Massachusetts Press. Small, C. (1998). Musicking—​ The meanings of performing and listening. Wesleyan University Press. Snyder, B. (2000). Music and memory: An introduction. MIT Press. Théberge, P. (1997). Any sound you can imagine: Making music/​consuming technology. Wesleyan University Press. Thibeault, M. (2010). Hip-​hop, digital media, and the changing face of music education. General Music Today, 24(1), 46–​49. Tobias, E. S. (2013). Composing, songwriting, and producing: Informing popular music pedagogy. Research Studies in Music Education, 35(2), 213–​237. Valenzuela, A. (1999). Subtractive schooling: U.S.-​Mexican youth and the politics of caring. State University of New York Press. Vulliamy, G., & Lee, E. (1976). Pop music in school (1st ed.). Cambridge University Press. Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in society: Development of higher psychological processes. Harvard University Press. Williams, D. A. (2011). The elephant in the room. Music Education: Navigating the Future, 98(1), 51–​57.

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An Art Class for Music

Music technology is a cross-​disciplinary subject that sits somewhere between music and engineering (Hugill, 2012). Teaching the engineering side is meaningless without teaching the musical practices that the engineering side makes possible. Since the topic here is pop music production, we recommend incorporating the learning strategies used by pop musicians as well: working with musical materials chosen by the learners; aural learning by listening to and copying, recordings; learning in friendship groups with minimal adult guidance; learning in personal, sometimes haphazard ways; and integrating listening, playing, singing, improvising, and composing (Green, 2002). It is effective to teach music technology using creative prompts that encourage students to develop individual voices that they can use to express their own ideas and thoughts (Ruthmann, 2007). Examples of these prompts are given throughout this book, so that they can be used to guide students from tightly scaffolded and formulaic production exercises to more open-​ended creative projects.

2.1. Portfolio Creation The digital studio is a musical instrument in its own right (Thibeault, 2010). Like all instruments, the digital studio is mastered only through practice. While purely technical exercises might have some value, the best and most culturally authentic way to practice using the studio is to make songs. By the end of a music technology course, students should have a portfolio of music they’ve produced and that they’re proud of. The word “portfolio” may be a little too formal for students’ tastes, though; they may prefer to call their collection of songs an album, an EP, a playlist, or a mixtape. It’s a constructivist axiom that music students work best when they feel like they are making something of value. Alex Ruthmann (2006) argued that the best curriculum activities derive from real-​world activities, ideally retaining the essential values of the original. The objects and operations of the adapted activity should be genuine instances of the original activity, however simplified. Classroom music and “real” music should be one and the same whenever possible. Digital production is ideally suited to this goal, since student productions can sound quite legitimately “real.” It feels wonderful to walk away from a class with a mixtape of your own great-​sounding tracks! Schools generally draw a clear separation between observing or reading about an activity and actively engaging with it, with the former preceding the latter. However, Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0002

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constructivist theory says that the best learning occurs when students have opportunities for active participation from the outset. Consider the way that kids learn playground games. There’s no formal instruction; they simply hang on the edge of the circle and follow along until they feel confident enough to jump in and stumble through the game. There is no clear separation between observer and participant; if you’re standing in the circle, you’re a member of it. Furthermore, peripheral participation is a strong scaffolding that kids let go of when they stop needing it. Educators can provide the equivalent scaffolding in their creative project structures, as is discussed below.

2.2. Computer as Tool Versus Computer as Medium Mark Marrington (2011) drew a contrast between the computer as a musical tool and the computer as a musical medium. A computer is a tool when it is used to do things that could have been done some other way—​for example, when one writes a score in Sibelius rather than with pencil and paper. By contrast, the computer is a medium when it is used to do something that would be impossible or inconceivable otherwise, like manipulating audio samples in Ableton Live. Software that was meant to be a tool can unexpectedly turn into a medium. Pro Tools was designed as an easier and cheaper replacement for the multitrack tape recorder, as a way to record live performances, but producers use it for music creation from scratch using loops, samples, and MIDI. Even notation software can become a medium, since these programs are effectively MIDI sequencers. Young students use notation editors to create wildly complex patterns that are copied and pasted into dense ostinati and played back on improbable instrument combinations (Wise, Greenwood, & Davis, 2011). They treat their digital scores as the finished product rather than as an intermediate stage that will eventually culminate in a live performance. Working with the computer as a medium doesn’t just affect the resulting sounds. The visualization systems used in digital audio workstations (DAWs) can change the entire conceptual imagining of music. For example, producers are constantly zooming in and out across timescales. At one extreme, they manipulate fragments less than a millisecond long, while at the other, they view long and complex compositions compressed to fit into a single screen. Producers can manipulate blocks of audio and MIDI of any arbitrary length, treating them as “objects” rather than as sequences of events. With the DAW, music is not just experienced as unfolding in time, but can be conceived of as a group of objects in visual space. We are only beginning to understand the aesthetic implications of this shift. For beginner-​level students, the most profound change brought on by the computer as medium is the way that it encourages naive experimentation. The computer gives students immediate auditory feedback for their every move, so trial and error is a perfectly practical way to approach learning. Songs on the radio are increasingly likely to be produced by musicians who learned their craft by sitting in front of the computer and figuring everything out by ear. As Adam Bell (2013) put it, “Purchasers of computers are purchasers of an education” (p. 316). The main service that teachers can offer young producers is to save them tedious effort, by directing their playful experimentation more efficiently.

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2.3. Songwriting and Sound Creation 14 

Nonmusicians tend to think of composition as an elite or specialized practice, but it doesn’t have to be. All young children spontaneously make up songs, which can sometimes be strangely catchy. (Ethan’s son wrote his first song at age four without any prompting or assistance; he was inspired by an episode of Thomas the Tank Engine.) For many young people, music consists entirely of songs (Kratus, 2016). After elementary school, however, school music is more about “pieces” than songs. Music technology classes should center songwriting, for its cultural relevance as well as its lifelong learning benefits. Few adults have the opportunity to compose for a jazz big band or a symphony orchestra, but anyone with a guitar, keyboard, or smartphone can write and perform songs. Before the digital era, there was a clear distinction between writing a song and performing or recording it. The Beatles and the Beach Boys can be thanked (or blamed) for collapsing that distinction. Albums like Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) and Pet Sounds (1966) were as much about their realization in sound as they were about their underlying notes, chords, and lyrics. Many of the songs on those albums can only meaningfully exist as recordings. What was avant-​garde studio practice in the 1960s has become thoroughly mainstream now. “Although there are certainly valid distinctions to be made between ‘songs’ and their realization in sound, for much popular music such distinctions have become increasingly difficult to make. . . . The term ‘sound’ has taken on a peculiar material character that cannot be separated either from the ‘music’ or, more importantly, from the sound recording as the dominant medium of reproduction” (Théberge, 1997, pp. 190–​197). Every pop producer is a sound artist, not just a song artist. The creative impact that technology has had can be heard by comparing the pop songs of past decades to current ones. As the timbral palette available to even casual musicians expands, producers have come to rely less on “musical” devices like melody and harmony, and more on sound itself as a structuring element of songs. For example, it’s common to structure a song using “accumulative form,” the process of “building up a groove gradually from its constituent parts” (Spicer, 2004, p. 33). This preference is due in part to the affordances of the linear sequencing visualization scheme used by DAWs (Marrington, 2011), but it has an aesthetic basis as well. As listeners anticipate the “drop” (the moment when the full groove is revealed), they become imaginative participants in the music, trying to predict where the sound is headed, and what will happen after the change. Formal and technological advances in popular music are mostly led by dance producers. The bodily experience of dance feeds back into pop music production practices, even in the “relatively detached and analytic practices of electronic production, as when programming a drum machine” (Théberge, 1997, p. 172). Listeners feel the “rightness” of a drum pattern both intellectually and intuitively. Because so much contemporary musical creativity is wrapped up in sound itself, the “musical” aspects of something like drum programming can’t really be separated from the “technical” ones. Pop production is an aural tradition. There’s a truism in jazz: “All the answers are in your record collection.” The audio production version says: “All the answers are in your iTunes and Spotify playlists.” Critical listening, therefore, needs to be a main aspect of musical pedagogy. Students who

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are the most devoted music fans have been doing critical listening for their entire lives without realizing it, as they scrutinize their favorite songs down to the last detail. There are some specific techniques that educators can use to help students listen more imaginatively, to reverse-​engineer the sounds they hear, and to imagine alternatives; those techniques are addressed later.

2.4.  Remixing One of the best ways to scaffold creativity in the digital studio is to give students raw material to work with, so they aren’t paralyzed by the terror of a blank screen. Every DAW comes with a library of royalty-​free loops, and some of these loops have featured in well-​known songs. For example, the beat in Rihanna’s Grammy-​winning hit “Umbrella” (2007) is a GarageBand loop called “Vintage Funk Kit 03” (Sorcinelli, 2016). Third-​party loop libraries are available as well, and the producer Frank Dukes releases albums whose sole purpose is to be sample sources for other producers (Whalen, 2016). MIDI files can also be used as remix material; they can be effortlessly located online. There is an entire site devoted to the works of Johann Sebastian Bach in MIDI format (jsbach.net/​midi), and another site devoted to MIDI versions of public-​domain piano rolls (trachtman.org/​rollscans/​RollListing.php). More contemporary material is widely available as well, although copyright restrictions will be a consideration. Any score created by a notation editor can be exported to MIDI format. MIDI files are a more flexible and more advanced remixing challenge than audio loops, because they can be edited at the individual note level, and they can be played back on any software instrument.1 It’s becoming increasingly common for artists to release music in multitrack “stem” formats, and many famous songs’ multitracks are in circulation online, although not always legally. Pop and dance music producers have been quietly circulating remix-​friendly “white label” versions of songs to DJs for decades, but some are beginning to offer these versions to the general public as well. Sites like Indaba.com host regular fan remix contests. Remixing familiar songs used to be the domain of professionals, but now it’s opening up to amateurs too (Michielse & Partti, 2015). Remixing is a perfect scaffold for creating original tracks from scratch, because there is a smooth continuum from remixing to composition.

2.5.  Sampling The central problem facing any musician right now is the fact of recorded music. There’s just so much of it, and it’s all so effortlessly accessible, so what more could anyone possibly add? Why book a funk band when you could have a better time by hiring a DJ to play Michael Jackson and Prince? Why go hear a jazz band when you could stay home with the complete works of Miles Davis? Recordings similarly pose a problem for performers who want to interpret a well-​known song. A recording locks in the listener’s idea of how

1 Ethan discovered that J. S. Bach’s Two-​Art Invention no. 4 sounds wonderful when played back on Ableton Live’s Latin Percussion Kit B.

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a song is “supposed” to sound. This is especially true in rock and pop, where the specific sonic qualities of the recording are as salient as the underlying performances, notes, and lyrics. Someone who wants to interpret a canonical recording like a Beatles song has to either imitate the recording as closely as possible or accept that their version will likely sound “wrong.” Fortunately, hip-​ hop and electronic music offer another way to adapt to our recording-​saturated world. The recordings themselves can be used as raw material for new expression. It’s conventional to think of the cut-​and-​paste aesthetic (Söderman & Folkestad, 2004) as an act of desperation, as a thing people only do if they can’t, or won’t, learn to play real instruments, but this is a misconception. Sampling is an aesthetic choice consistent with the history and values of the hip-​hop and electronic dance music communities, an exercise of intellectual, social, and artistic power. Through sampling, fans can enter into a conversation with their favorite recordings and use their visceral familiarity to create intertextual reference and shocks of recognition. Looping a sample doesn’t just refer to the original; it creates new musical meaning, too. The loop repeatedly juxtaposes the end of a phrase with its beginning. “After only a few repetitions, this juxtaposition, along with the largely arbitrary musical patterns it creates, begins to take on an air of inevitability. It begins to gather a compositional weight that far exceeds its original significance” (Schloss, 2013, p. 137). This way, familiar recordings can be made strange, and, then, through repetition, strange sounds can be made familiar. Sampling copyrighted songs is more complicated, morally and legally, than using royalty-​free loops and public-​domain MIDI files, but this very complication makes sampling a culturally significant act. Sampling bridges consumption and production: “It requires cultural workers to rearrange the symbols, phrases, rhythms, and melodies circulating within American culture into something completely new” (Schur, 2009). Simply knowing that sampling is possible changes the experience of listening to music—​as audiences attain “DJ consciousness” (Sinnreich, 2010, p. 202), they become alert to the creative possibilities of every recording, rather than hearing it as being metaphorically carved in marble. More than any other contemporary production practice, sampling raises contentious debates about originality, intellectual property, artistic propriety, and the whole definition of musicianship. There is no way to practice sample-​based production without engaging in cultural criticism. Composers and improvisers have always reworked existing music, but there’s something intuitively different about sampling recordings, because sampling removes a layer of abstraction. “The locus of action is no longer limited to the idea of the music, located within conceptual mechanisms such as melody, chord changes, or composition. What is acted on in these new practices is the musical expression itself, the indexical codification of sound waves in a fixed medium” (Sinnreich, 2010, p. 74, emphases in original). The ability to use familiar sounds, not just note sequences, is a creative experience without any cultural precedent, and it is one that has transformed popular culture. To include samples in an official release, artists have to obtain permission from the copyright holders of both the master recording and the underlying composition. The rights holders usually grant permission in exchange for a fee. Unlike the statutory rates set by the compulsory license governing cover songs, rights holders for samples can

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charge any amount of money for clearances, and license fees can run into many tens of thousands of dollars. On a practical basis, however, copyright holders don’t care what amateurs and students do. It may be technically illegal for amateurs to sample copyrighted songs without permission, but it is more like jaywalking than grand larceny. The important question is not whether sampling is legal; the question is whether it’s ethical. The law permits everyone to use a GarageBand loop however they want, but some artists feel just as uncomfortable incorporating such a loop into an original song as they would feel about a copyrighted sample. Artists, educators, and students must decide for themselves whether using pre-​existing audio and MIDI in their “own” music is morally acceptable.

References Bell, A. P. (2013). Oblivious trailblazers: Case studies of the role of recording technology in the music-​ making processes of amateur home studio users (Doctoral dissertation, New York University). Green, L. (2002). How popular musicians learn: A way ahead for music education. Ashgate Publishing Group. Hugill, A. (2012). The digital musician (2nd ed.). Routledge. Kratus, J. (2016). Songwriting: A new direction for secondary music education. Music Educators Journal, 102(3), 60–​65. Marrington, M. (2011). Experiencing musical composition in the DAW: The software interface as mediator of the musical idea. The Journal on the Art of Record Production, (5). https://​www.arpjournal.com/​asarpwp/​experiencing-​musical-​composition-​in-​the-​daw-​ the-​software-​interface-​as-​mediator-​of-​the-​musical-​idea-​2/​ Michielse, M., & Partti, H. (2015). Producing a meaningful difference: The significance of small creative acts in composing within online participatory remix practices. International Journal of Community Music, 8(1), 27–​40. Ruthmann, A. (2006). Negotiating learning and teaching in a music technology lab: Curricular, pedagogical, and ecological issues (Doctoral dissertation, Oakland University). Ruthmann, A. (2007). The composers’ workshop: An approach to composing in the classroom. Music Educators Journal, 93(4), 38. Schloss, J. G. (2013). Making beats: The art of sample-​based hip-​hop. Wesleyan University Press. Schur, R. (2009). Parodies of ownership : Hip-​hop aesthetics and intellectual property law. University of Michigan Press. Sinnreich, A. (2010). Mashed up: Music, technology, and the rise of configurable culture. University of Massachusetts Press. Söderman, J., & Folkestad, G. (2004). How hip-​hop musicians learn: Strategies in informal creative music making. Music Education Research, 6(3), 313–​326. Sorcinelli, G. (2016). From GarageBand loop to Grammy award: A look back at Rihanna’s “Umbrella.” medium.com/​micro-​chop/​rihannas-​grammy-​award-​winning-​ umbrella-​is-​a-​garageband-​loop-​3e1430446363 Spicer, M. (2004). (Ac)cumulative form in pop-​ rock music. Twentieth-​Century Music, 1(1), 29–​64. Théberge, P. (1997). Any sound you can imagine: Making music/​consuming technology. Wesleyan University Press. Thibeault, M. (2010). Hip-​hop, digital media, and the changing face of music education. General Music Today, 24(1), 46–​49.

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Whalen, E. (2016). Frank Dukes is low-​key producing everyone right now. thefader.com/​ 2016/​02/​04/​frank-​dukes-​producer-​interview

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Wise, S., Greenwood, J., & Davis, N. (2011). Teachers’ use of digital technology in secondary music education: Illustrations of changing classrooms. British Journal of Music Education, 28(02), 117–​134.

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Understanding What a School Really Wants

3.1. Who Makes Decisions About Curriculum? Launching a new course requires convincing all the relevant stakeholders. In many American public high schools, the stakeholders include the teachers, the principal, and counselors. Students and parents also have a role—​if students don’t sign up for the course (or aren’t allowed to), it won’t succeed. Here are some strategies for winning over the major stakeholders.

3.1.1. The Teacher A pitch for a new course has to begin with the person who will be teaching it. No new program can successfully launch without a teacher driving the curriculum, since the curriculum will have to align with the teacher’s skills, abilities, and interests. Students can sense a teacher’s passion (or lack thereof) for the subject matter, and they will react in kind. When music technology classes are imposed on music departments from above or outside, the results are not pretty. There are many teachers who would love to offer a music technology, songwriting, or recording class but who feel apprehensive because they don’t have the right background. This is natural and normal. When these teachers drive the creation of the curriculum, including the choice of tools and software, they can control their own learning curve. They will have a better experience getting up to speed, and that will lead to a better experience for their students.

3.1.2.  Administrators Whether you are a teacher, an arts leader, an outside contractor, or a principal, it is essential to understand the chain of command within a school system. In an American public school, the top of the chain is the board of education, the equivalent of a board of directors in the business world. This body is elected by the community to oversee the school district’s top-​level appointed administrators. The board typically does not manage day-​to-​day business of schools; instead, they work with top administrators of each school to develop broad policies and common goals. Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0003

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Under the board of education, there are usually two equally powerful administrators, the superintendent and the treasurer. The treasurer controls the flow of money into and out of schools, sets budgets for each building and program, and decides (with the board’s approval) how much everyone gets paid. The superintendent is in charge of everything else, from curriculum offerings and personnel to district communications. The superintendent usually has a few direct reports (sometimes called directors or simply central office staff), one of whom has a title like director of curriculum. (This role may also be shared among a few individuals.) The director of curriculum ultimately decides whether a course can be offered or not, and they usually have authorization to request the money for salaries and materials. Within a particular school, the building principal is the first contact for most teachers and outsiders thinking about pitching a new course. An outside contractor looking to partner with a school can contact the principal directly to discuss terms and negotiate a deal. There will be some red tape to get through, but not as much as it takes to create a permanent class with district staffing. Creating a permanent class offering requires that discussions begin early, at least nine or ten months before the class begins. If school starts in August, discussions must begin in the previous October or November. The process begins with a course proposal to to the building principal. If the presentation goes well (and you should always give a presentation), offer to repeat your performance for the director of curriculum, or potentially the superintendent, depending on the district’s internal politics. The specific roles and identities will be different in each district, but these steps are a good starting point.

3.2. Selling the Lab-​Based Music Course Convincing an American public high school to add a music technology course to the schedule will require some specific talking points aimed at various stakeholders. These talking points can be adapted to other audiences as well, such as private schools, universities, and community organizations.

3.2.1. Administrators and School Leaders When addressing administrators and school leaders, focus on the ways that a music technology course will solve their problems, not yours. Administrators prefer that students are taking more classes for credit and having fewer study halls. They also prefer that students choose to take a class rather than being forced into it due to scheduling. Present the new class as a supplement to, rather than a replacement for, traditional music programs. Do not compete with the band or choir, and do not prevent band and choir students from taking the class either. Your class will probably be a one-​or two-​semester affair, while band and choir often run over the course of six years or more. The music technology class should be competing with other one-​semester electives, not with the entire band program. Many administrators like the idea of creating culture at their school, especially if it engages students who are not currently being addressed. Try to present a larger vision than “just a class.” Explore flexible credit options that take advantage of your tech-​heavy environment and that draw in a wider group of potential students. Administrators care about state standards, but they are more flexible with elective offerings. They generally see the standards as descriptive rather than prescriptive, especially in the arts. Therefore, it is not

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very effective to argue that a new class will promote standards. It is more effective to say that the new class will promote real-​world career paths, and that it can lead to internships. Be sure not to create more problems than you solve. Administrators may be concerned about the copyright implications of your course, so be prepared to answer their concerns. For example, assure them that you will keep produced material inside the classroom as much as possible.

3.2.2.  Teachers If you are aiming to convince another teacher to teach music technology, be sure you have the right person in mind. Teachers who are not excited about teaching music with computers or who are overly reliant on IT support will probably not create good experiences for students. Other music teachers will need plenty of assurance that the new course will not be competing with them. Be sure to preemptively assuage any fears that the music tech program will “steal” students from traditional ensembles. Secondary ensemble directors tend to see their own program as the most important part of the department, with the most public benefit, and they will defend their territory. Try to schedule classes during times that do not conflict with the traditional programs and that enable as many students as possible to participate in both activities. Traditional ensemble directors also tend to find music tech to be threatening at a cultural level, due its cachet and pop-​cultural relevance. Encourage questions about and challenges to your program’s breaks with tradition, but do not spend too much energy engaging with a hostile audience. You must convince administrators of your program’s utility, but you do not necessarily need to convince all music teachers.

3.2.3.  Parents Lab-​based music technology classes are not performance-​based programs, by design. Therefore, music tech teachers will probably have less parent contact than a traditional band or orchestra teacher would. Conference nights are an excellent opportunity to show off the lab and students’ projects. Parents love to see any kind of creative output from their children, especially if it’s unexpected. Consider promoting your program through a showcase night where visitors can listen to music that students have made. This type of event can be called a “gallery walk,” which might pair well with the district’s art show or another public event.

3.2.4.  Students Of all stakeholders, students will be the most naturally receptive to music tech classes. This does not automatically guarantee they will enroll, however. Since students are the primary “customers” for any new course, center their experience at all steps in your journey. When designing projects, consider the “totally lost” student and the “totally ahead” student to be your main points of focus. If the activity is enjoyable for, and inclusive of, both groups, you will have a recipe for long-​term success. Students trust other students more than any adult. Have advanced or older students promote your classes and clubs through word of mouth, and also have them appear in staged events. Students who have their peers’ admiration should be your “invisible

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directors,” since they will be the most effective in getting their younger peers interested in joining your program.

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3.3. How Music Tech Benefits the Master Schedule In an American public high school, the master schedule is the list of every class from every department, offered to every student, fitting together into a patchwork of four to eight class periods per day. Some classes have prerequisites, which makes them harder to schedule. Think about a well-​developed band program with three or more concert bands, divided by audition results. The students in the highest band must meet at one time of day, which means other classes they are enrolled in cannot meet at that time. Adding a band, choir or orchestra does not just impact the music department, it impacts when AP (advanced placement) courses can be offered, and what time of day traveling teachers can depart for their other building. More than any other department in a high school, the music department has extremely difficult scheduling requirements. By contrast, a music tech class that is open to any student regardless of their prior music background is a scheduler’s dream. If the music department assigns just one teacher to an elective open-​enrollment class like music tech, the counselors in charge of scheduling students suddenly have an entire grade level freed up to move into and out of classes.1 (See the note below about graduation requirements.)

3.4. How Music Tech Benefits the Music Department’s Profile A music department that offers only ensembles will reach only a particular subsection of the larger student body. These students will have been preselected by skill set, not to mention the ability to purchase instruments and to take private lessons. The potential pool of ensemble members is subject to attrition each year, and each year it gets harder for beginners to jump in. By high school, the band students are three or four years ahead of beginner level, and joining as a novice is usually impossible. This silo effect creates a deep social divide between the “band kids” and the rest of the student body. The “othering” of the music department has grave consequences beyond social alienation of students. Administrators may question the need for a large budget required by a class that serves only a few students. Since most community members are not former band kids, they will also be less inclined to fight cuts to music programs when it’s time to vote for tax levies. Even administrators can have trouble supporting music programs in such an environment.2 If the music department is hard to schedule, is expensive, and benefits only a small percentage of the student body, then it must find other ways to make itself relevant. Many teachers have turned to competition results as a way to justify their program, but this strategy relegates a program to the same status as an extracurricular sport. In our opinion, this is a downgrade.

1 When Ethan’s college-​level Intro to Music Tech courses are open to nonmusic majors, they are always mobbed. 2 One admin who was discussing scheduling told a colleague of Will’s, “If I were king for a day, the music department would vanish.”

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Kenneth Elpus and Carlos Abril’s (2019) study of American school music program enrollment found that, while 94% percent of elementary schools and 91% of high schools offer curricular music education, only 24% of the class of 2013 enrolled in at least one year of a course in band, choir, or orchestra at some point during high school. Because of the costs of instruments and lessons, ensemble participants are more likely to be more socioeconomically privileged than the school population generally. The Eurocentrism of traditional ensembles and programs often makes them unappealing to Black and Latino students. Ruth Gustafson (2008, p. 271) described a 97% attrition rate of Black students from elective music programs in her racially diverse school. Beyond the absolute number of new students that music tech programs attract, they can also change the demographics of a program by inviting groups of students who would not have been interested otherwise: the rap and techno aficionados, the rock musicians, the singer-​songwriters, the DJs, the bedroom producers, and so on. Offering a mass-​appeal class of high quality that teaches culturally relevant and transferrable skills to all ages can go a long way toward ameliorating the struggles of a traditional music program. Music tech students come to see their peers who play instruments in a new and more respectful light. Traditional students see that talent doesn’t always come from training, and that good taste and creative inspiration can be just as valuable as the ability to play an instrument. Teachers see a program attain greater unity, and they witness their students’ discovery of their creative side and their application of their performance skills in new ways. Administrators are relieved to have the music department contribute to the master schedule in helpful ways, rather than only absorbing time and resources. Most importantly, the community sees an engaged and relevant music department focused on the needs of the entire student body, rather than just the needs of their ensembles.

3.5. Sweetening the Deal with Graduation Requirements Every region has different graduation requirements, and a music tech class can fulfill more than one. Consider offering your class for: • Fine arts credit (as an alternative to a music history course) • Technology credit (as an alternative to an office or business skills course) • Internship credit (many schools have tracks focusing on real-​world skills like business and journalism) • Career center programming (many schools with a career center build certifications like Avid and Adobe into their music tech program) It is difficult to offer advanced classes, but you can work around that by allowing students who have completed the intro course to repeat it for credit or to do independent studies. Most of Ethan’s advanced students have taken this route.

3.6. Getting Funding and Staying Funded Funding in an American public high school can come from inside or outside the school district. Funds from outside the school district typically come in the form of grants, either from foundations with formal application requirements or from direct relationships with

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business partners interested in promoting education through their products or services. Some public school districts even have a staff member whose sole focus is writing grant applications. When writing a grant application, especially a local one, check with administrators first to be sure the organization has not already received requests from the school. You do not want your application to beat your boss’s application, especially early in your career! Schools typically love when the money for a program comes from a grant, but recurring grants are extremely rare, and you cannot depend on them for the long-​term health of your program. Many once-​glorious music tech labs have fallen into disrepair because no money beyond the initial grant was set aside to invest in the program’s future. Inside a school, there are two general categories of money in the spendable budget (not counting payroll): instructional money and permanent improvement money. Instructional money can be used to buy just about everything in a classroom, but it is typically reserved for items that are not planned to last beyond a few years. Permanent improvement money, on the other hand, can only be spent on items that will last five years or more. Music tech equipment can often belong in either category. Instructional money is often divided by building, but in many medium to large schools, there is also a separate music budget. Music is treated as its own “building,” since the program is usually designed to work vertically from elementary through high school. If this is the case, the music technology program should receive some sort of line in the budget. We recommend allowing an amount per year lower than what the large ensembles receive and higher than what the elementary classes might receive. The important thing is that budgetary support continues from year to year. If an initial class offering is built out into a full-​fledged program, something on the order of a few thousand dollars per year is necessary just to keep the equipment refreshed and in good shape; larger projects like building a recording or video studio are obviously much more expensive.

3.7. Protecting Your Investment At a minimum, all the lab equipment must be functional each year. In our experience, this means you will need to: • Replace at least half of the headphones every year. • Replace/​repair anything that got broken each year—​things will break even if you’re careful. • Replace computer workstations roughly every four to five years to keep them running fast. • Upgrade software every three to four years or as needed. • Replace or repair MIDI controllers every five to ten years or as needed. • Replace classroom speakers and the teacher sound system every ten to twelve years. • Replace video equipment every five to six years in order to keep up with changing formats. Nothing you buy will be permanent. Try to avoid buying the most expensive possible items. Professional equipment is priced the way it is because big corporations invest in the equipment to create content that makes the money back. A $9,000 microphone might

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sound terrific, but it will not be generating revenue for the classroom the way that it would in a professional studio. Most of the time, a “prosumer” option is a wiser investment and will get you 90% of the quality you need for 10% of the price. When school budgets are being decided, be sure to advocate for your students. Plan a unit, an event, or an activity around your equipment needs and show how the investment in your program will serve the goals of the community—​and the goals of those who decide the budget.

3.8. Criticisms of a Nontraditional Music Class Every innovation faces resistance. Any of the stakeholders mentioned above might be critical of a music tech program, but in our experience, the strongest resistance comes from other music teachers. Administrators, parents, students, and the community at large are mostly pragmatic and are rarely driven by passions or ideology, but music teachers are the opposite. In order to have become licensed, public school music teachers needed to attain significant mastery of Western classical music. They had to practice for hours, perfecting their craft, even while their professors told them not to expect to make much money and their parents urged them to have fallback plans. On the job, music teachers confront extraordinary demands on their time, energy, and emotions. Teaching music is neither easy nor lucrative; it is a calling and a passion. Music teachers teach because they are good at it and because they belong in the profession. Imagine, then, how threatening it is to them when someone comes in wanting to shake things up. The conservatory culture of music education programs exerts a strong hold on educators who pass through it. Here are actual comments we have received from our peers: • A music teacher shouted during a presentation: “You’re destroying music education!” • A coworker, after a demonstration of the Ableton Push, scoffed: “This is all just instant gratification.” • After a demonstration of how students can program a drum machine, a teacher concluded: “So it’s like cheating.” • An administrator, after seeing a student project, observed: “I don’t really get it, but they seem to be having fun.” • During students’ electronic music performance at the state convention, the head of a state music educators association told students: “Shut this music off!” • An internet commenter fulminated: “[Hein] wants classical Eurocentric music REMOVED from the curriculum. He wants it gone. He doesn’t want it to exist, he doesn’t want it taught. He wants a key part of Western civilization erased from the cultural memory.” Hip-​hop attracts the strongest invective, since it is still socially acceptable to declare it not to be music at all. Classical musicians often dismiss pop music for its accessibility and supposed simplicity, and music educators are often quick to criticize it based on standards of conservatory culture (Figure 3.1). Be prepared for these challenges, and counter them with ideas for contributing to your school’s culture in ways that no stakeholder can deny. To paraphrase labor union

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Figure 3.1

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An anonymous meme that circulates periodically through music education Facebook groups—​ Ethan has christened it “You kids like the wrong music.”

advocate and attorney Nicholas Klein: “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”

References Elpus, K., & Abril, C. (2019). Who enrolls in high school music? A national profile of U.S. students, 2009–​2013. Journal of Research in Music Education, 67(3), 323–​338. Gustafson, R. (2008). Drifters and the dancing mad: The public school music curriculum and the fabrication of boundaries for participation. Curriculum Inquiry, 38(3), 267–​297.

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Tech You Will Need for Your Program

This chapter presents a best-​case scenario equipment list. How much of it is “need to have” versus “nice to have” will depend on your budget. The chapter lays out an optimal setup, something to fundraise toward if your program is not currently able to support it. No matter what else you are able to purchase, you should have one workstation per student. Students will need to be able to record and to listen to their ideas privately before allowing others to listen, but they should also be able to easily share and collaborate when the time comes. Here is the music technology equivalent of Maslow’s (1954) hierarchy of needs, ordered from most to least important: • Computer with DAW (digital audio workstation) software • Headphones • MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) input device • Microphone • A dedicated creative space • Soundproofing

4.1. The Computer Like musical instruments, computers come in a variety of price-​to-​performance ratios, and only some of them can be considered to be “professional-​level” devices. Professional tools are adaptable and long-​lasting and can be used to make creative projects with a high level of polish. It is possible to make professional-​level recordings on a Chromebook, a tablet, or a phone, in the same way that is possible to perform at a professional level on a $50 violin. However, it is more difficult than using the right tool for the job. The type of computer you choose for your lab can depend on the age of your students and your educational goals. If your goal is to model a professional workflow, you will want the tools used by professionals: • One Mac or PC laptop or desktop computer per student • A hard drive large enough to accommodate projects, samples, and loop libraries (at least 512 GB as of this writing) • Enough RAM (memory) to smoothly keep open a professional DAW and several web browser tabs simultaneously (at least 8 GB as of this writing) Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0004

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• A modern multicore CPU to smoothly run several audio streams simultaneously (at least four cores as of this writing; Intel core i5 or equivalent)

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The GPU (graphics processing unit) of a computer is important for video applications, but it is less important for music production. If you do plan to incorporate video, give some consideration to graphics performance and make sure that H.264 video is accelerated either through a GPU or another onboard system, such as Apple’s T2 chip. The computers should have headphone jacks. If the computer has only one or two USB ports, you will need hubs to allow additional USB audio devices to be plugged in simultaneously. We are not partisans in the Mac versus PC debate. However, the Core Audio drivers built into macOS have long been considered more stable and lower latency than the default audio drivers for Windows. There are workarounds for Windows audio, such as adding ASIO drivers, but they will add troubleshooting steps to your setup.

4.2.  Headphones In a lab situation, closed-​back wired headphones are a must. Wired earbuds can work, but they should not be shared among students for hygienic reasons. There are many headphone brands at any given price point. You can get reasonably good headphones for $80 to $100 a pair. At lower prices, the sound might still be acceptable, but the headphones will be less durable. The most important consideration is the headphone model’s frequency response, its ability to reproduce the full range of audible frequencies accurately and at the same level. You can find this information on the product web page and on the packaging. The range of human hearing is 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz; ideally, your headphones should be able to reproduce that full range. The ideal frequency response curve is flat, meaning that the headphones do not boost or cut any frequency. No headphones have a perfectly flat frequency response, since their built-​in speakers have sweet spots and dead spots, but flatter curves are better. You can compare frequency response with a chart like the one in Figure 4.1. Note that some consumer-​grade headphones have intentionally unflat frequency response in order to make certain genres of music sound better. For example, Beats headphones boost the bass and cut the mids, which enhances the sound of hip-​hop and pop in noisy environments. If you try to mix on Beats, you will not be getting an accurate sense of how your projects “really” sound. If students provide their own headphones, be sure they use wired ones. AirPods and other Bluetooth headphones are popular, but they suffer audio latency that can range from 120 to 500 milliseconds. While this is acceptable for media playback, it is unusable for music creation.

4.3. MIDI Input Devices It is possible to enter MIDI via the computer keyboard and mouse or trackpad. However, these methods are clunky, difficult, and unsatisfying. A genuinely musical experience requires MIDI controllers. These come in all shapes, sizes, and forms. Most include a piano-​style keyboard, but they may also include pads for drumming, knobs, faders, and touchscreens.

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19.713 Shure SRH440 Target Response: 90 Shure SRH440 Left: 83.374 Shure SRH440 Right: 83.05 Beats Solo2 Wireless Left: 92.459 Beats Solo2 Wireless Right: 91.912

Frequency Response (Averaged and Compenstated)

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Frequency response curves for two popular headphone brands. Their midrange is comparable, but the low end differs significantly, as does consistency in the higher frequency range. The dashed line on 90 dB SPL indicates a balance of all frequencies, which is ideal for mixing.

Figure 4.1

Amplitude (dB SPL)

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For the piano keyboard component, the number of keys is the main differentiating factor. Having 88 keys is nice, but it is unnecessary for production purposes. Such large controllers are expensive and require custom furniture. For most producers, 25 keys are perfectly adequate. Weighted or semiweighted keys are more satisfying to play and are more durable than thinner single-​layer keys. It is essential that the keys be velocity sensitive (i.e., sensitive to how hard you are pressing). The computer’s regular QWERTY keyboard is not velocity sensitive, which makes “musical typing” unsatisfying. As for other physical controls—​the more the merrier. Turning a real knob is always more satisfying than manipulating a graphic of a knob on the screen. It is especially valuable to have pitch bend and modulation controls, because these parameters are difficult to access otherwise. Some controllers also include an on-​board arpeggiator, which is fun to use (see Figure 4.2). Some controllers supplement or replace the piano keyboard with a grid of touch-​ sensitive pads (Figure 4.3). As far as the computer is concerned, pads and keys are

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Figure 4.2 This MIDI controller has a built-​in arpeggiator, which can send arpeggiated MIDI notes to any DAW software. Hardware features like this can potentially make up for shortcomings in software functionality.

Figure 4.3 Native Instruments Maschine is a popular finger drumming controller that is deeply integrated with Native Instruments software.

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Figure 4.4 Midi Fighter 3D by DJ TechTools is a programmable MIDI finger drumming controller built around arcade-​style buttons. Finger drumming artists like Shawn Wasabi sometimes create customized MIDI lighting feedback for their controller of choice.

interchangeable, since both send identical MIDI messages. The pads are there because it’s awkward to play drums and trigger samples with piano keys. Pad controllers can have anywhere from 8 to 64 pads, some with unusual layouts such as the MIDI Fighter, which is comprised of arcade-​style buttons arranged in a grid (Figure 4.4). Bigger pads are better for drumming, while having a larger number of smaller pads affords more possibilities for clip launching, DJing, and melody playing. Some grid controllers are tightly integrated with specific DAWs, like Native Instruments Maschine (see Figure 4.3), or Push and Ableton Live. Larger and more complex controllers like Push require a more sophisticated software system to manage them, but they also enable a wider variety of workflows and expressive methods within a single device. You may find this appealing, or you may prefer to play melodies on one device, turn knobs on another, and play drums on a third.

4.4. Getting a Space Your ability to get a dedicated space for your music lab will depend on your school situation. Sometimes a shared computer lab will suffice, and music-​specific items can be locked up when your class is not using them. If you have a small number of students, another option is to use an existing space, like a large practice room or storage area that already exists inside your school’s music classrooms. Of course, the ideal environment is a full-​size classroom dedicated to a permanently installed music lab, but this isn’t always possible. One strategy for getting a dedicated space is to initially hold classes in a shared computer lab. Most teachers, in public schools especially, will not start teaching music tech as a full-​day schedule. This means that you will be sharing the lab space. If possible, try to share space with another arts-​focused course, such as digital design or photography. The creative environment will lend itself more to cross-​pollination and word-​of-​mouth collaboration than a music tech class that meets in a room usually used for Microsoft Office. Another idea is to use laptops to create a collapsible lab space that can be easily moved from location to location. This is not ideal, because it will make it difficult to provide large MIDI controllers or interfaces for each student. However, if no other options exist, you

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can make it work. If you’re reading this book, you probably want to go deeper than what an iPad-​based music class affords, so at the very least, you need a laptop-​based lab with some sort of table space that allows longer periods of focus on work without lots of movement in the background. Obtaining a permanent space for an electronic music lab goes hand in hand with selling your program and its benefits to your school’s administration.

4.5. Possible Room Configurations The configuration of the music lab space should ideally reflect the way you teach the course. Unfortunately, many lab setups are instead dictated by the placement of network and electrical outlet locations and are not flexible in their configuration. If you have the luxury of designing a music lab space, consider what the class will look like during various activities: • Will you be able to make eye contact with students during a lecture? • When projects are demonstrated, will each student be able to see the large projection screen, or will several smaller screens be placed around the room? • Will there be “good seats” and “bad seats” in terms of visibility, comfort, or sound quality? Remember that the main goal of an electronic music classroom is creativity. It is important to use every resource, including your room setup, to allow all creative types to flourish. If the room feels cramped, or stations feel too isolated, or if the lighting feels more like a doctor’s office than a creative space, it can dampen the magic sparks of inspiration that students are trying to catch. Teaching in such rooms is an uphill battle. While each lab space is different, here are a few insights from Will’s experience as both a teacher and an installer of music labs around the US. Keep the focus on the creative tools as much as possible. Center the keyboard or MIDI controller, and consider placing the computer keyboard and mouse/​trackpad to the side. Hide cables as much as possible. If the room is set up in rows (Figure 4.6), consider the height of the screens. If they are too large for you to see the students from your teaching location, it means that their view is blocked, too. Consider angling the screens or un-​straightening the rows to achieve better lines of sight. If stations are set up around the room’s circumference against the outside walls (Figure 4.5), add extra empty space in the corners and areas on the same wall as a projection screen. Consider placing your teaching location in a corner to allow more straight lines of sight. If your desk is at the end of a row of students, then the students at the other end of the row will have trouble seeing you. In addition to the main projection screen, consider adding auxiliary screens around the room to allow students to stay in their workflow while watching a short demonstration. Make sure the sound system is placed so all students can hear a wide frequency range from all spots in the room. A pair of 8-​inch monitor speakers will often sound better in a classroom than a larger PA system, because small speakers are more directional. Position speakers in the corners of the room, facing in toward the center. There will be a “sweet spot” in the middle of the room, but sound will carry to every seat and will retain enough bass frequency information to have clarity.

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Figure 4.5 A music lab configured with workstations around the room’s circumference and small interior islands. The area on the left is a small performance and rehearsal space.

Figure 4.6 A music lab arranged with workstations in straight lines, with the back row facing the wall.

Don’t hide behind too much equipment at the teaching location. Have a path cleared that allows you to step away from the station to speak, and try to establish a few different places to “stage” your teaching depending on the lesson. Consider having a science-​lab-​ style demonstration table for larger equipment. Use document cameras to allow a close-​up view of your MIDI controller or other hardware. No one enjoys squinting to see the details while you awkwardly hold a piano keyboard upright.

4.6. Choosing Other Hardware for the Lab Think of your lab as a high-​tech version of an elementary music classroom. Just as elementary music rooms have common-​use items like Orff xylophones, hand drums, and spots on the floor to sit, you have devices and software that students use every day. And just as elementary classrooms have unusual items that might appear only once a semester, like parachutes,

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so too can you have items for special days.1 Here are a few items that might have a single use during a lab course, but could be handy to have around for extracurricular groups as well:

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• A theremin for demonstrating the roots of electronic sound production • An analog synthesizer for demonstrating attack/​decay/​sustain/​release • A finger drumming station, or a “synth shop” with various synthesizers available to test and to check out for project use • Video cameras and portable recorders for field recording DJ equipment and technique are beyond the scope of this book, but they are a significant aspect of the electronic music world. Having a show-​and-​tell day with a DJ who uses vinyl or a specialized controller makes for a memorable experience. Your students may also get a kick out of cassette recorders and other retro equipment. One of Ethan’s colleagues at NYU brings in a hand-​cranked gramophone and plays wax cylinders. Your basement or attic may hold similar treasures.

4.7. Setting Up an Individual Station All student stations should be as identical as possible in hardware performance, functionality, and physical layout. Plan the individual stations to optimize equipment placement first, and then decide how to position stations along a shared table. If your lab has individual tables, be sure that each student has the same amount of space. Feature the main music controller device as much as possible, and move less-​frequently-​used items off to the side (Figure 4.7). As students use the stations, they will unintentionally inform you how to optimize the setup by moving the equipment around. Once you have chosen a setup, commit to it for an academic period so students can learn expectations for keeping stations neat and tidy from session to session. Use paper templates, rulers, or tape marks on the tables to make it easy for students to help you keep things tidy (Figure 4.8). We take inspiration from the way that retail stores display their items. For example, Apple stores have a policy of tilting all laptop screens at a 70º angle, which is slightly too closed. A person of average height will adjust the screen to try the laptop, and when they touch the lid, they feel the response of the hinge and develop an immediate physical relationship with the device (Gallo, 2012). A good lab encourages this kind of discovery, too, and it can make a surprisingly large difference in student engagement. For example, if you place grid controllers on risers angled toward the user, it invites students to use the top row of encoders and allows them to see the display more easily.

4.8. Building on Existing Infrastructure Of course, your lab may exist already, in which case many of the design decisions will have already been made by someone else. What should you do if the lab is set up in an unsuitable way? There are two common responses that we do not recommend: 1. Do nothing, just put up with it, even if student experience is compromised. 2. Complain to administrators that your room is not adequate. 1 How much fun was parachute day? So much fun.

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3 Feet/91.5 cm total width

Mic

Individual student workstations shown to scale. (The computer footprint is not shown—​ in actuality, the machine sits under the monitor or is mounted behind it.) Both setups place the MIDI controller closer to the student than the typing keyboard to encourage MIDI controller use. Angled setup (left) uses a 12º angle on the MIDI controller and an IKEA laptop support, which places the Push controller at a slight angle to encourage discovery toward the top of the device. The equipment angles are reset each day.

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Figure 4.8

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Using templates to assist with equipment placement can make quickly resetting stations a part of the daily routine.

Instead, it is more constructive to find out how other teachers in the school secured dedicated spaces for their classes, especially the ones who teach electives. These teachers have demonstrated greater demand for their course, which they have probably built through a long curation of a positive student experience. Create that positive student experience, and the space, equipment, and funding will come.

4.9. Day-​to-​Day Considerations Wear and tear on equipment is inevitable. You can mitigate it with room procedures, but your yearly budget will have to cover some replacement and repair. Treat some equipment as permanent infrastructure, while thinking of other items as having a life cycle measured in years or semesters. Assuming you are already training students to take proper care of equipment, here is how much life you can expect out of your gear.

Headphones: Replace Every One to Two Years After a few years, you will be able to predict how many headphone repairs or replacements you will need each year, and you can simply preorder that many units. You will want to have replacements ready to go immediately when a unit breaks. Headphones usually break on the hinges around the ear cups, or through the electrical connection between the two ears.

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Computers: Replace Every Four to Five Years When purchasing a computer, expect to hang onto it for a while, and if it is different from what the rest of your building is using, be sure to either order new units yourself or try to propose an upgrade schedule to your IT department. Once the computers feel old, students will assume everything you teach is also old and out of date.

MIDI Controllers: Replace Every Five to Ten Years MIDI controllers do not need to be replaced very often, but you may want to change devices from time to time to keep pace with technological and cultural changes.

Microphones, Synthesizers, Studio Racks: Replace Every Eight to Ten Years These items may never need replacing at all, and many will someday be considered desirable vintage gear. With microphones in particular, the question is whether to buy cheaper models that will need to be replaced more often, or to buy higher-​end models that students will consider it a privilege to have access to. Both strategies work, but we recommend higher-​end equipment when possible, because it has a cool factor that is powerfully motivational.

4.10. Maintenance and Cleaning You should do regular maintenance and cleaning in your lab to keep it running well, and, more importantly, to keep students feeling like they are learning in a futuristic and professional environment. Routine cleaning is especially important if you are worried about disease transmission, which, as we write this, is very much at the front of our minds. Here are a few general maintenance tips: • Provide sanitizing wipes at each station and use the last few minutes of class for the cleaning procedure, especially for the touch surfaces. • If you are using external microphones, consider models with an easy-​to-​clean pop filter like the Rode NT-​USB. • Consider not sharing headphones, or using disposable earphone covers for each class. • Consider using trackpads rather than traditional mice, which are harder to keep clean. Beyond special disease precautions, we recommend the following routine maintenance schedule.

Once a Day • Straighten stations and wipe down work surfaces.

Once a Month • Replace headphone pads that are cracking. • Replace broken headphone units as needed.

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Figure 4.9 Using Automator to empty specific folders on macOS.

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• Test internal networking, and update plugins and software as needed to keep stations consistent. • Check MIDI controllers for responsiveness and adjust as needed.

Once a Semester (or When Students Change Over) • Reset computer stations to Day 1 status, remove personal folders, and check software installs and sound libraries.

Once a Year • Update computer operating systems and core DAW software as needed. Try to avoid doing this when classes are in session so as not to disrupt students’ workflow. Consider automating this process with a script. On macOS, Automator can be used to create a one-​click solution for emptying out user-​populated folders quickly at each station (Figure 4.9). • Pack up music-​specific equipment, such as mics, headphones, and MIDI controllers. Clean up cabling behind stations, and optimize anything that didn’t work the previous year.

Once Every Few Years • Consider optimizing desk placement, and try respacing stations, removing all equipment, and resetting everything to be “new” again.

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References Gallo, C. (2012). How Apple store seduces you with the tilt of its laptops. forbes.com/​sites/​ carminegallo/​2012/​06/​14/​why-​the-​new-​macbook-​pro-​is-​tilted-​70-​degrees-​in-​an-​apple-​ store/​ Maslow, A. (1954). Motivation and personality. Harper & Brothers.

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Ableton Live and Push

This chapter is an overview of our preferred combination of software and hardware, Ableton Live and the Push controller. The chapter explains how they differ from other digital audio workstations (DAWs) and MIDI interfaces.

5.1. An Optimal Setup When we recommend Live and Push to other music educators, we hear the same objections: they are more expensive and (seemingly) more complicated than other software and digital instruments. Nevertheless, if your budget allows, you will find that Ableton’s products support a wider range of expressive, creative, and educational possibilities. If GarageBand is like an acoustic guitar, then Live is like an electric guitar with an array of effects pedals. You can have a long, satisfying life as an acoustic guitarist, but there are areas of guitar practice that are accessible only via electric. So it is with Live and Push. In order to understand what makes Ableton Live special, it is worth pausing briefly to consider what the purpose of a DAW is in the first place. DAWs were originally intended to be faster and more expedient versions of multitrack tape recorders and mixing desks. However, DAW functionality has expanded far beyond that original use case. The same thing happened with word processing programs: they started out as a replacement for typewriters, but they eventually grew to include graphic design, spreadsheets, and online collaboration functionality. So, too, have the musical possibilities of the DAW evolved beyond recording and mixing to enable new forms of compositional practice. Contemporary producers use the DAW not just to record existing songs, but to create songs from scratch. Songwriters will often go into a recording studio without any prepared material and build ideas up by recording and editing improvisation (Seabrook, 2012). Brian Eno (2004) used the term “playing the studio” to describe the process of composition through manipulation of recorded sound. The advent of laptop computers has also made it possible to use the DAW as an onstage performance instrument. Musicians use computers to play software instruments, to trigger sample playback, and to process audio via effects. Ableton Live was designed from the outset as a live performance instrument (thus its name). While Live can be used as a digital “tape recorder,” its main purpose (and main value) is as a real-​time expressive instrument, a way to literally play the studio.

Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0005

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Live combines composition, improvisation, recording, editing, and listening into a single act. It gives the user the simultaneous experience of composer, performer, and audience. While any DAW can provide a similar experience, Live affords it most directly and easily. This is why it is worth both its cost and the learning required to make the most of it. The composer Morton Subotnick prefers Live over other software because it does not impose a single musical metaphor: “Many programs tell you what they think you want to make. . . . [but Live is] not modeling a piano and it’s not modeling a synthesizer. It’s a vessel, unlike most things that are already full. It’s an easel, a platform on which to create work” (quoted in Richardson, 2014). This quote conveys both the promise and the challenge of Live.

5.2. Why These Tools? The creators of Live assume that its users are working in the electronic idiom. Rather than trying to accurately model acoustic instruments and analog recording equipment, Live is geared toward synthesized, otherworldly sounds. Therefore, many of the included instruments and effects only make sense in an electronic style. One of Ethan’s favorite Live effects is Beat Repeat, which randomly stutters short segments of audio in tempo. Beat Repeat is an easy way to automatically insert some variety and unpredictability into sequenced or looped material. It has a futuristic, semirobotic quality that sounds fantastic in techno or hip-​hop, but it sounds exceedingly strange in classical music or rock (though it might be worth a try). Live is also different because of its quick response time. It is so computationally efficient that changes to its state are instantaneously audible during playback. By contrast, in Logic Pro or GarageBand, there is a lag of a few seconds between when you make a change and when you hear the result of doing so. This may not seem like a very big deal, but it makes a substantial difference in the experience of working creatively. Imagine how frustrating the piano would be if there was a one-​second delay between when you pressed a key and when the note sounded! Live responds more like an instrument than like a composition or editing tool, which makes it more conducive to flow. Some of the seemingly utilitarian features of Live have unexpected creative applications. For example, it includes several different time-​stretching algorithms, each of which yields different results when pushed past its intended limits. Using Beats mode with a short decay time creates a rhythmic stutter. Using Tones mode or Texture mode creates granular effects that sound especially intriguing on vocals. And Complex mode sometimes produces a lovely digital shimmer reminiscent of sound effects in The Matrix (1999). Just as guitar distortion went from being a technical mistake to an intentional creative effect, so have Live’s time-​stretching algorithm artifacts become expressive tools as well.

5.3. Ableton Live Basics: Arrangement View and Session View Live is really two DAWs combined: a traditional linear multitrack tape metaphor called Arrangement View, and a performance instrument called Session View. If you have used other DAWs, Arrangement View will be mostly familiar. Session View, however, is quite

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different. It is the aspect of Live that is most challenging to learn, but it is also the one that makes Live uniquely powerful and versatile. All user interfaces operate within the limits of our ability to draw metaphorical connections between visual images and abstract concepts. Software interfaces guide and shape their users’ creative products, especially when the users are inexperienced. There is an entire generation of electronic musicians whose main teachers have been DAW interfaces. (For a deeper discussion of interface metaphors and their power to shape musical thought, see Bell, Hein, & Ratcliffe, 2015.) Most DAWs, including Pro Tools and Logic Pro, are based on the metaphors of multitrack tape and the mixing desk. Live’s Arrangement View uses the same metaphors. However, Live’s Session View uses a radically different metaphor: the spreadsheet. Each cell in Session View can contain a clip (a segment of audio or MIDI). Clip playback can be triggered in a variety of ways that are discussed below. Clips can be any length from a few milliseconds to several hours. Conventionally, however, clips are one-​, two-​, or four-​measure looping phrases. A row of clips is called a scene, and scenes can be launched in the same way that clips can. The typical use case for scenes is to create song sections. One scene might contain a song’s introduction, while other scenes contain the first verse, chorus, second verse, and so on. Performers can step through scenes in their intended order or play them out of sequence, as they see fit. By default, clip launching is quantized at the measure level. When you trigger a clip, Live waits until the downbeat of the next measure before it begins playback. It is also possible to quantize each clip to other note values, or to not quantize them at all. The automatic quantization makes it effortless even for novice musicians to play clips with good-​sounding results. We have seen preschool-​age children make great dance grooves using quantized clip launching. In addition to manual launching, Live can also launch clips automatically using algorithmic “Follow Actions.” You can use Follow Actions to play a set of clips in sequence one time each, to play a set of clips in a random order, or to introduce chance and random probability into your playback. The clip launcher has proven to be influential, and other software makers are beginning to imitate it. As of this writing, Logic Pro, the iOS version of GarageBand, Digital Performer, FL Studio, and Bitwig Studio all incorporate versions of the clip launcher. However, Ableton’s is the most robust and versatile. The challenge for people wanting to use Session View (or other clip launchers) is not learning the software, but learning the model of musical creation that the clip launcher affords. Session View treats production and composition as a performance, a spontaneous set of actions carried out in the moment. The closest analog to Session View is DJ performance, but DJs typically play back entire songs, not components or fragments. The clip launcher is a genuinely new visualization and organization scheme, with potentially profound significance for its users’ musical imaginations.

5.4. Ableton Push Overview Push is a grid controller surrounded by knobs, buttons, and one long touch strip. It was designed specifically for use with Live, although it also works as a generic MIDI controller with other programs. The most conspicuous feature of Push is its colorful grid. While the grid can be used for clip launching, it also functions as an alternative to the standard

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piano-​style interface, and it is this function that has the greatest potential significance for music education. Ableton’s goal with Push is to enable users to produce a complete song from scratch without ever looking at the computer screen. This is only possible if you use a specific workflow centered entirely on Session View, however, since Arrangement View is only really accessible onscreen via the computer. Push is most valuable as a performance instrument and as a tool for recording loops. To turn loops into finished songs, and to perform fine-​grained mixing and editing, it is easier to use the computer.

5.4.1. Do You Really Need One? It is possible to create electronic music using only a computer, via the touchpad and keyboard. You can drag and drop loops and audio regions, edit MIDI in the piano roll, and draw automation curves without using a controller. Some professional producers spend their entire careers working this way. However, it is not the most satisfying, intuitive, or inviting approach. Humans are tactile creatures, and the haptic feedback we get from physical interfaces is an essential dimension of musical cognition, one that players of traditional instruments take for granted. There are uncountably many MIDI controllers available, and all of them work with Live. However, only grid controllers like Push give you tactile control over Session View. In the past decade, Live’s popularity has given rise to various grid controllers designed specifically for clip launching. The grid of touchpads corresponds to the Session View clip layout. Tapping a square in the grid triggers the clip in the corresponding cell in the software. In addition to the physical satisfaction of tapping the pads, grid controllers offer a futuristic look that is powerfully attractive to young people. Push is the most sophisticated and versatile clip-​launching interface we know of.

5.4.2. Techniques Afforded by Push You probably do not think of editing audio in a DAW as a form of music performance (we didn’t for many years), but it is one! You take an action, hear the musical result, take another action, and so on. DAW production differs in one important way from performing with instruments: if an instrumentalist does nothing then there is no music, but computers continue their playback until you actively make them stop. Ableton cofounder Robert Henke put it this way: “In electronic music, there’s a lot of ways to create something that runs—​that is static, but nevertheless, it’s creating something. Take a drum computer: you turn it on and it plays a pattern . . . the pattern is there, but the action of the person who is playing the drum computer is changing the pattern” (quoted in Butler, 2014, p. 105). Computer musicians can listen in a detached way to their own creations as if they were someone else’s music. This “listener stance” is a prerequisite for good improvisation. Clip launching further facilitates improvisation by quantizing the rhythms, which reduces the fear of playing incorrectly. Improvisation is a gratifying aspect of musical creativity, but it is also a practical necessity for reducing the option paralysis inherent in digital music creation. If you load a clip onto each slot of the Push’s 8 × 8 grid, then you can play 16,777,216 possible combinations of clips. If you include the possibility of not playing anything on a given column, then there are 43,046,721 possible combinations. There are two ways to manage

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all those possibilities. One is random chance (e.g., using Follow Actions). The other (more satisfying) approach is improvisation: finding your way around the grid by intuition.

5.4.3. Drum Programming

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Before Ableton Live, grid controllers were most commonly used as an interface for drum machines and samplers, like the iconic Akai MPC. To create music with an MPC, you map samples (typically drum sounds) to the pads, and then perform them using a technique known as finger drumming. While it is possible to finger drum on a piano-​style keyboard, it is awkward and unappealing compared to using pads. While MPCs usually have 16 pads, Push has 64, enabling users to create enormous “drum kits.” You can also use the Push grid in a similar manner to Roland’s 808 and 909 drum machines, building up drum patterns one sound at a time via step sequencing. In this mode, the top four rows of pads each represent a two-​bar pattern, and each pattern contains eight sixteenth notes. You select a drum sound (kick, snare, hi-​hat, etc.) and tap the pads corresponding to the sixteenth notes where you want that drum to play. In this mode, you can still use the bottom left quadrant of the Push for live MPC-​style finger drumming. The bottom right quadrant acts as a sequencer for all your patterns. This multiplicity of interface metaphors seems confusing at first, but it also opens up a wider variety of learning and creative styles.

5.4.4. Chords and Melodies You can use the Push to play melodic instruments via MIDI, though the experience is quite different from the piano keyboard. In its default melodic layout, each pad on the Push grid plays a note in the chromatic scale from left to right, with rows staggered in fourths. This note layout is identical to the bottom four strings on a guitar, or the four strings on a bass. Ethan is a guitarist who has struggled for his entire life with piano-​style controllers, and he loves being able to use his familiar chord and scale shapes on the Push. By default, the notes in the C major scale are lit up in white, and the roots are lit in blue. You can select from a list of other scales, including the diatonic modes and some non-​Western scales, and the lighting scheme will change accordingly. You can also change the root to any chromatic pitch. There is an alternative Scales layout in which the grid plays only notes from the given scale, with no other notes available. This effectively turns the Push into an electronic Orff xylophone. Students can mash buttons with the confidence that there will be no wrong notes. This mode is especially valuable for novices and younger children.

5.5. Comparisons to Other DAWs Ableton Live is not the best DAW for every use. Every DAW has its own feature set and price point. Here we compare three of the most prominent alternatives to Live. Avid’s Pro Tools is the audio equivalent of Microsoft Office: the universal standard in professional settings. (Also like Office, Pro Tools is more widely used than loved.) Commercial studios almost always use Pro Tools for tracking live performances and final mixing. Producers who do their creative work in Live will often transfer their tracks to Pro Tools for the final polish. Students who aspire to work in professional audio settings

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should certainly learn Pro Tools, the same way that office workers need to know Office. However, for creative production, songwriting, and working out ideas “from scratch,” Live is more flexible and accessible. Apple’s Logic Pro occupies a middle ground between Live and Pro Tools. Logic’s mixing, editing, and effects routing capabilities are almost on par with Pro Tools, with a large loop library and set of instruments for composers and producers. Logic also has some of the most sophisticated MIDI editing features of any DAW, including the ability to display MIDI as standard notation (though the user’s ability to edit that notation is limited). GarageBand users will find it easy to make the transition to Logic, since the two programs are the same “under the hood.” Logic is also relatively inexpensive. For all these reasons, many producers swear by it. However, Logic is better suited to recording existing ideas than to live performance or improvisation. Image-​Line’s FL Studio is popular with hip-​hop artists, and it is used by some dance music producers as well. It was only available on Windows until recently. FL shares some of Live’s loop-​centric affordances, and it has many features and presets specifically geared toward hip-​hop. Like Logic, FL Studio is comparatively inexpensive. Useful as it is for contemporary popular styles, however, FL’s interface is cluttered and overwhelming, and its live performance capabilities are underdeveloped. Anyone interested in more alternatives to the programs discussed here should look into Native Instruments’ Komplete, Propellerheads’ Reason, MOTU’s Digital Performer, Steinberg’s Cubase, Cockos’ Reaper, and Bitwig GmbH’s Bitwig Studio.

References Bell, A., Hein, E., & Ratcliffe, J. (2015). Beyond skeuomorphism: The evolution of music production software user interface metaphors. Journal on the Art of Record Production, (9). https://​www.arpjournal.com/​asarpwp/​beyond-​skeuomorphism-​the-​evolution-​of-​music-​ production-​software-​user-​interface-​metaphors-​2/​ Butler, M. (2014). Playing with something that runs: Technology, improvisation, and composition in DJ and laptop performance. Oxford University Press. Eno, B. (2004). The studio as compositional tool. In C. Cox & D. Warner (Eds.), Audio culture: Readings in modern music (pp. 127–​130). Continuum International Publishing Group. Richardson, J. (2014). Morton Subotnick: “There’s no direction. Things explode in all directions.” Cyclic Defrost. cyclicdefrost.com/​2014/​03/​morton-​subotnick-​interview​by-​jason-​richardson/​ Seabrook, J. (2012, March). The song machine. The New Yorker.

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PART II

Creative Electronic Music Projects for the Masses The first part of this section goes through the basic process of designing relevant, lasting, and engaging projects for students of all levels, and gives suggestions for assessing these projects. The second part explores three main areas of teaching music technology that can be used to design lessons. Each subsection includes an overview of the pedagogical philosophy underlying the projects, the challenges they pose, and a few example projects. Each project example is structured as a how-​to guide with a suggested procedure and tips on teaching and assessing. Projects are demonstrated using Ableton Live, and alternatives for users of other software are included.

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Designing Creative Music Projects 49 

Designing projects for a music production class poses technical, logistical, and creative challenges. One of the biggest challenges is serving students with a wide range of musical ability and experience. You may have band and orchestra kids who have been playing instruments since they were three years old alongside self-​taught rock guitarists, aspiring DJs, and quite a few students without any previous music background at all. An optimal learning experience balances challenges with students’ capabilities—​if the task is too hard, they will be stressed and anxious, and if it is too easy, they will be bored. The “sweet spot” in the middle is what Mihály Csíkszentmihályi (2008) called the flow channel. But how do you keep a class in the flow channel if the students have huge differences in their ability levels? Class projects will need to have goals that are attainable by students with little or no musical experience, while also challenging those with more experience to extend the projects and to explore within them. This chapter presents strategies for designing projects that are consistent in their results, customizable to your and your students’ needs, and achievable by anyone who walks in the door.

6.1. Working with Beginners If you want to teach creative novices, it’s important to banish the word “talent” from your vocabulary. We do not believe that any such thing exists—​“talent” simply describes previous opportunity and motivation to learn. Behaving as if talent is real is directly counterproductive to learning. If you dismiss a young person as “untalented,” the negative effects on their motivation will be obvious. But you also do no favors to the students who are judged to be “talented.” If they believe that musical ability is innate, when they experience difficulty or unfamiliar challenges (as they inevitably will), “talented” students are likely to conclude that they are not cut out for the task.1 We advocate instead for a growth model of music, which holds that musical ability is attainable by anyone with practice and effort. Students who think of their learning in terms of a growth model experience difficulty not as failure, but as a challenge to be met. They are more likely to pursue solutions to the problem, to develop new strategies for learning, and to see their efforts “as a necessary and interesting part of learning or 1 Ethan has seen complete novices do better in his intro-​level music tech classes than accomplished instrumentalists because the novices are unburdened with any sense that they have a fixed or innate level of ability. Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0006

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acquiring new skills” (Evans, 2015, p. 326). When students are praised for their efforts rather than for their (supposedly) innate abilities, they receive a substantial and immediate boost to their desire to learn. Intro-​level music pedagogy usually starts with the smallest elements of music: isolated, decontextualized pitch and duration values. But these concepts are actually quite abstract and are difficult to understand. Beginners intuitively understand music in larger chunks instead: riffs, rhythmic figures, and short tunes. Jeanne Bamberger (1996) called these chunks musical simples. We like to start with projects that use pre-​existing loop libraries because they let beginners work at the level of musical simples. Once they experience some creative successes, then the beginners are motivated to descend to the level of individual MIDI events and drum hits. A good analogy is a chemistry class: The most fundamental units of matter are electrons and quarks, but chemistry teachers don’t begin with them, because subatomic particles are unfamiliar and difficult to understand. Instead, chemistry class begins with familiar compound substances like air and water, before delving into how those substances are made of smaller components. Music is best presented to beginners in the same way.

6.2.  Philosophy Our approach draws on constructivist pedagogy, which operates from a few axiomatic assumptions: • Learning by doing is better than learning by being told. • Learning is not something done to you; rather, it’s something done by you. • Learners are not containers that get filled with knowledge and new ideas by the world around them; rather, learners actively construct knowledge and ideas out of the materials at hand, building on top of existing mental structures and models. • The most effective learning experiences grow out of the active construction of things that are personally or socially meaningful, that are developed through interactions with others, and that support thinking about your own thinking. • Learning takes place through four main activities: designing, personalizing, sharing, and reflecting. Constructivism favors learning by doing, discovering, and inventing (Papert, 2000). It’s important that students’ discoveries be genuinely new, and that they aren’t merely “discovering” what the teacher already knows. Students will be most excited about ideas that solve real problems in the context of a personal project. The related approach of constructivism assumes that “children will do best by finding (‘fishing’) for themselves the specific knowledge they need. . . . The kind of knowledge children most need is the knowledge that will help them get more knowledge” (Papert, 1993, p. 139). The word “constructivism” intentionally evokes the idea of construction sets, both in the literal sense of Lego kits or Play Doh, and in the more metaphorical sense of programming languages and frameworks. Construction of ideas works best if the activity inside students’ heads is supported by the making of something “out in the world” (for example, recorded music), because students can show, discuss, examine, and admire such products. See the discussion of the “Meaningful Engagement Matrix” in Chapter 15 for a constructivist approach to assessing projects.

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Mitchell Resnick (2007) pointed to kindergarten as a major source of inspiration for constructivist pedagogy. At its best, kindergarten is a place where children are working with their hands and their senses, designing, creating, experimenting, and exploring. The materials—​blocks, crayons, clay, and the like—​support multiple learning and creative styles and don’t limit the kids to predetermined outcomes. In kindergarten, play isn’t opposed to learning; play is learning. This teaching approach need not be limited to young children. Genuine creativity often resembles open-​ended and unsystematic tinkering. The conventional idea of tinkering is working without a goal or purpose, or without making noticeable progress. However, you can also choose to view such seemingly aimless activity as a valuable and necessary aspect of creativity. The tinkering approach is “a playful, experimental, iterative style of engagement, in which makers are continually reassessing their goals, exploring new paths, and imagining new possibilities” (Resnick & Rosenbaum, 2013, p. 164). Much musical creativity results from tinkering with the tools to see what emerges.2 Teachers can support tinkering by emphasizing process over product, by setting themes rather than narrow goals, by highlighting diverse examples, by posing questions instead of giving answers, and by encouraging reflection.

6.3. Process Versus Product Most elementary music teachers place process over product when designing their lessons, valuing the developing and practicing of skills more than they value the presentation of those skills in a performance setting. An elementary music class that rotates through a variety of singing, playing, and movement activities will naturally cover more educational ground than one that simply rehearses the winter program every class meeting. A constructivist approach does not mean that students’ creativity has to be entirely freeform. Constraints are necessary, both to give projects a finite boundary and to keep the students from being overwhelmed with option paralysis. “The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees one’s self of the chains that shackle the spirit” (Stravinsky, 1947, p. 64). In a lab-​based music class focused on projects, the ability to create legitimate-​ sounding tracks is a significant motivating factor. Students have built a considerable latent expertise in recorded music aesthetics through their own listening experiences. “A history of personal and collective consumption” teaches young people “not only an awareness of the general outlines of musical style but even the precise ‘feel’ for the details of musical form” (Théberge, 1997, pp. 172–​173). In no other music class can students build portfolios of recorded songs in their preferred styles and bring their tracks with them into their future music-​making lives. So music technology teachers need to balance open-​ended creativity with scaffolding students’ ability to produce music that actually sounds good to them. Each pop subgenre has characteristic sonic and musical gestures that culturally define and situate it, which are sometimes known as tropes. Deploying the right tropes signals to listeners that you are immersed in the culture to which you are contributing. Using recognizable tropes necessarily imposes some constraints, but that does not make tropes incompatible with creativity. There is a useful parallel here to standup comedy. Most comedians include a few jokes about flying in airplanes in their set, even though the 2 The authors’ own education in music technology has consisted mainly of tinkering.

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format has hardened into a set of tired clichés. The best comedians use the airplane joke format because of its familiarity, not in spite of it, taking advantage of its well-​known structure to make their unique voice and sensibility stand out in relief. When you play African-​American genres like blues, jazz, and funk, you are similarly expected to put your own personal twist on a shared repertoire of clichés and tropes, to “signify” on them in the words of Henry Louis Gates (1988). When students are required to use the tropes of house or trap, it ensures that their projects will be stylistically legible, and signifying on those tropes is a firm platform for original ideas. Here is an example of a checklist of tropes for a genre-​based project: Vaporwave Project Music from a dream about a post-​apocalyptic version of the future imagined from the point of view of the 1980s in which all we can remember is advertisements. Required elements: • Tempo between 60 and 90 BPM • At least one smooth-​sounding 1980s sample, slowed and pitched down • At least one drum track that uses the 1980s drum samples with a gated reverb effect • At least one MIDI clip that has been converted from a sample and cleaned up • Sidechain compressor on all synths, triggered by the kick drum • Sidechain gate (optional) on a synth, triggered by the hi-​hat • Sound FX one-​shots to supplement • aesthetic (a feeling that is nostalgic yet futuristic) • At least two minutes long These are all elements one would expect in a vaporwave track, and any project that attempts to include all of them will sound recognizably like vaporwave. If you are focusing on a musical concept (e.g., chord progressions) or a production technique (e.g., mixing and EQ) rather than a genre, you will probably not use identifying tropes for your project requirements. Instead, you can use track setup or form as your structuring elements. We recommend using common language rather than academic terms whenever possible. If students know the term “verse-​chorus-​verse-​chorus,” you will signal that you are a cultural outsider (Finney, 2007) by insisting on describing it as “A-​B-​A-​B, which in practice is a modified rondo form.” Here is an example of a checklist for a technique-​focused project: Slow Jam Project Our first 100% original song. Requirements: • Tempo under 100 BPM • All parts made by hand (no loops except for “duct tape” transitions) • Drumbeat track (at least three clips) • Chords track (at least three clips) • Arp track (the same three clips as the chord track) • Bass track (the same three clips as the chord track, with the notes lowered and top notes removed)

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• Melody • Three scenes: verse, chorus, and bridge • Eight bars per scene • Finished arrangement has parts removed from the verse and bridge to make them lighter • Fuzzy boundaries between sections

6.4. Customization and Aesthetic Opportunities Beyond its required elements, every project should have some opportunity for customization and personalization. If a project for 30 students is designed without any room for personal touches, the result will be 30 copies of the same song. It’s a delicate balance; if projects are too open-​ended, then it will be difficult to keep a class of 30 students moving at roughly the same pace. Fortunately, students are able to exercise meaningful creative choice even within a tight structure. You might invite your students to customize their projects by ending the song however they want (fade out, end tracks one by one, sudden ending), by adding transition sound effects of their choosing between form sections, by choosing instruments and drum kits, or by choosing a tempo within a given range. If you want to allow wider (and riskier) customization, you can open things up further: place no restriction on song form or length, place no restriction on the number of tracks, and allow any tempo.

6.5.  Pacing To ensure a good project pace, you will need to strike a balance between structure and tinkering. At one extreme are freeform projects entirely led by students’ own needs and wishes. At the other extreme are projects with rigorous criteria and hard deadlines. It is all too easy (and common) for teachers to begin on either of these extremes, both of which lead to student frustration. If the projects are too open-​ended, students with little musical experience will have trouble generating ideas because they won’t know what the possibilities are. Furthermore, even experienced musicians are daunted by a blank slate (Ruthmann, 2012). On the other end of the spectrum, a class that uses overly prescribed projects will guarantee consistent experience, but it will come at the expense of individual creativity. A great project-​based lesson does not need to stick to any one point on the strict-​to-​ loose spectrum. Over the course of a project, the early stages can be on the strict side, and then later stages can gradually move toward the loose side. Furthermore, as the course progresses, you can shift everything toward the “loose” side as students gain creative and technical confidence. The ultimate goal is for students to be able to create their own music outside of the lab without a teacher’s direction, so we always end our courses with a wide open “design-​your-​own” final project. If you are planning a typical 18-​week high school course cycle for a class that meets daily, you can do ten to twelve projects that span seven or eight class meetings each. If you are teaching college on a 13-​week course cycle with two class meetings per week, then you will need to do fewer projects and have students do most of their creative work outside of class.

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6.6. Listening to and Observing Students

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In his song “Still D.R.E.” (1999), Dr. Dre bragged about keeping his “ears to the streets” as a way to maintain his relevance in a changing world. So, too, must teachers respond reflexively to students’ interests. Just because students found a genre-​based project engaging last year, there is no guarantee they will respond to it next year. While classical music pedagogy can remain the same from one decade to the next, music technology teachers face the challenge of constantly reworking their curricula in the face of pop music’s rapid evolution. This is no small task! Teachers are not likely to enjoy the same kinds of music as their students, nor will teachers share their students’ cultural references. Meanwhile, teenagers rarely know how to describe the kinds of sounds they prefer, much less how to produce them. Even if they can describe their preferred music, students may be reluctant to tell a teacher about them out of fear of rejection or disapproval. So, to keep things fresh, you will need to do some ongoing ethnographic observation. There is nothing more embarrassing for a would-​be cool music teacher than being out of touch with students’ musical culture. (Ethan’s students mocked him mercilessly when they heard him pronounce “Rihanna” with a hard h.) It’s difficult to tell which of today’s trendy artists will be considered significant five or ten years from now. But if you can read trends well, the rewards are substantial: your class will be immediately more relevant to your students, and they will feel safer telling you more of their personal tastes. Ideally, you can create a sustainable feedback loop where you teach relevant styles and learn the newest trends from your students in the process. For adolescents, musical taste delineates ingroups and outgroups. It is not just a matter of entertainment; there are real social consequences to the power relations playing out through musical taste communities (Saunders, 2010). If you show students the respect of learning their language, they will return the respect in your classroom.

6.6.1. Techniques for Pop-​Cultural Ethnographic Observation 6.6.1.1. Read Trend-​Forward Music Websites Pitchfork, Stereogum, and Noisey are all great resources for current trends. Not everything they feature will become popular, but some of it will. All these sites maintain playlists on Spotify and Apple Music. 6.6.1.2. Listen to the Music Students Are Listening to Will has his students choose the background music for his classes’ TV announcements, and he uses their choices as a guide. Ethan has his students write a short essay about their favorite and least favorite songs and why they feel that way. 6.6.1.3. Identify the “Music Critics” and “Average Joes.” Let’s say that last year, the most trend-​forward music-​critic students started listening to a particular artist. This year, the artist broke through to top 40 radio, and the average Joes began listening to her. Are the music critics still listening to her, too? If so, it’s safe to assume that she will become part of the canon. If not, she will probably be a passing fad.

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6.6.1.4. Realize That There Is Noise Mixed with the Signal Sometimes groups of students will find obsessions that are disconnected from the wider world, or that are regionally specific. Will observed a group of music-​critic students who were deeply into Weezer in 2017, but that obsession did not herald a Generation Y Weezer revival. Ethan’s students in New Jersey are far more enthusiastic about speed metal and Bruce Springsteen than young people are generally.

6.6.2. Tips for Incorporating a New Trend in Your Teaching 6.6.2.1. Tie a New or Emerging Genre Back to Something Canonical There are uncountably many microgenres of four-​on-​the-​floor dance music, and keeping track of them is bewildering. Fortunately, all of them are rooted in disco. Even genres that sound totally unlike the Bee Gees may share substantial amounts of their DNA, since disco gave rise to the producer-​as-​auteur, the DJ-​as-​musician, and the widespread phenomenon of remixing. Did you know that the tempo of “Stayin’ Alive” (1977) is so steady because the drums are the same two-​measure tape loop all the way through? It’s effectively house music! 6.6.2.2. Know When to Retire Your Material If you sense that a genre is going out of fashion, be in control of its demise. You will probably prefer to come up with a replacement lesson, rather than forcing your students to slog through a genre they have lost enthusiasm for. 6.6.2.3. Keep Your List of Required Tropes for a Subgenre as Short as Possible House music has only a few required tropes (e.g., the aforementioned four-​on-​the-​floor), so it’s a genre amenable to a “go your own way” approach. By contrast, a genre like drum and bass is more formulaic, so it will have less scope for customization. 6.6.2.4. Always Have a Technical Rationale for the Project Trap is ideal for teaching how Note Repeat works on a drum machine. Dubstep is ideal for teaching FM synthesis. Vaporwave is ideal for teaching sidechain gates and compressors. You can get a sense for how keeping things fresh works in practice by considering Will’s anecdotal timeline of the dubstep project. • 2010: Dubstep is becoming a “thing” in Ohio, and Will notices his students listening to it. • 2011: Advanced students in Will’s electronic music group want to make dubstep tracks. He troubleshoots and assists, but he still doesn’t formally address the genre in class. • 2012: Will fully embraces dubstep and designs a project around creating harsh synth bass wobbles, resampling them, and reassembling them into a drop. Massive success! • 2013: Will continues to offer the dubstep project, and it continues to be popular. • 2014: The project remains popular with most students, but Will notices that the ones who pride themselves on being into the newest music are losing enthusiasm. He starts listening for a potential replacement. • 2015: Will restyles the dubstep project into a “birth and death of a subgenre” project. He focuses on earlier U.K. dubstep, rather than the now-​cliché American variety.

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• 2016: Will retires the dubstep project in favor of a future bass project, with techniques borrowing from the older project, but with more current-​sounding results. Massive success!

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Even if you don’t create an entire project around the electronic subgenre du jour, you can still work it into your class. Ethan has had some of his best days of teaching when he has asked students to explain styles like trap or djent to him. He has students recommend noteworthy examples, and then they all work together to find technical vocabulary to describe the key tropes.

6.7. The Project Formula The approach to a project can be boiled down to the following formula: Music concept + technology concept + fun hook = successful project. Like many music tech educators, we often design projects in order to teach ourselves a particular technique. Perhaps students have told you that they want to be able to remix a vocals-​only version of a song, which you have never done before. You can run a pilot version of the project with yourself as student. As you do, document the steps you’re taking. Then review your documentation with a student’s-​eye view. The process might look like this: 1. Choose a core technique to focus on—​for example, remixing an acapella track by adding new material in the background. 2. Identify elements that might be too difficult for beginner-​level students (e.g., syncing the acapella track to the metronome or determining the key) and elements that will be easily achievable (e.g., adding loops, identifying and tagging song sections, or editing clips around section boundaries to make transitions). 3. Consider how much complexity the students can handle. Reduce the process to the smallest number of steps that students will be able to successfully perform. Ethan enjoys doing high-​concept remixes, like making a new backing track for a Whitney Houston acapella using only samples of Miles Davis, but he recognizes that this is too abstruse to be a good beginner-​level project. 4. Look for opportunities to make the project customizable, while still guaranteeing that the project goal will be attainable by the lowest-​performing students in the course. In the case of remixing acapella tracks, you can eliminate the major pain points for beginners by doing some prep work: identify a few choice vocal stems, make sure they are tempo-​aligned, determine their key, and edit out any profanity. You can break project design into five basic steps: 1. Find a subgenre that students find relevant and engaging and identify its tropes: characteristic tempo, drum sounds, synth sounds, typical song form, and so on. 2. Make a sample project incorporating the most important tropes and using the smallest number of new techniques possible. 3. Break the project into discrete stages with a specific deliverable for each stage (a set of drum loops, three song sections, etc.). 4. As you demonstrate each step of the project to your students, do the project along with them. 5. Assess students’ work and their reaction to their finished products, and re-​evaluate and refine your plan accordingly.

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As you run projects repeatedly, refine them. Even successful projects can always improve—​ we constantly tinker with our pacing, for example. If a project is unsuccessful, identify the reasons why. Did it introduce too many novel concepts or techniques, so students felt overwhelmed? Was it too similar to a previous project, so students were bored? Did the genre fall out of popular favor?

6.8. Technical and Aesthetic Goals Each project should have both technical and aesthetic goals. A project can emphasize one aspect or the other, but it must address both. For example, in a drum and bass project with advanced students, the aesthetic goals might include sequencing broken drum variations, writing rhythmic bass lines, and choosing mysterious-​sounding progressions of two or three chords. The technical goals might include learning how to sample drum loops from sources “in the wild” and mixing sampled material with MIDI-​based material. For an ambient soundscape project, the aesthetic goals might include manipulating mood via consonance or dissonance and creating evolving synth drones, while the technical goals might include using audio effect chains, time-​stretching effects, and frozen reverb effects. You can also do “technical études” that are more aesthetically open-​ended; for example, you might require students to adapt existing MIDI files using any combination of software instruments. The goals of each project should fit into the goals of the broader course or program. Ask yourself: What do I want students to be able to do after completing my class? How do the class goals align with standards? You can divide your list of desired outcomes into technical and aesthetic goals (recognizing that there will necessarily be overlap). Technical goals include anything regarding software or hardware usage, and any specific track creation or recording methods. These goals develop students’ abilities. For example: • Students will be able to record and edit audio clips. • Students will independently identify song forms, such as verse and chorus. • Students will program a variety of drum grooves into a drum pattern sequencer. Aesthetic goals develop personal style and informed opinions and judgments. These goals should develop students’ creativity and taste. For example: • Students will express personal opinions regarding timbre when choosing instruments. • Students will mix tracks and make volume decisions based on comparative listening. • Students will customize a song by remixing it. Remember that a well-​designed project should include both technical and aesthetic goals. Here are the stated goals for the beatmaking project (Chapter 8.7). When students program and arrange beats, it is not enough for them to master the software and hardware aspects of doing so—​their beats should also be stylistically appropriate and satisfying to listen to. Therefore, the technical goals of the beatmaking project are: • Students will use Session mode on Push to trigger clips and to adjust track volumes. • Students will experience the workflow of beginning in Session View and ending in Arrangement View.

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The aesthetic goals are: • Students will make five to six different drum patterns, each with a slightly different feel. • Students will choose melodic clips that pair well with their beats. • Students will dynamically create a song form by triggering their patterns in Session View.

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Technical goals address the kind of material you typically find in a software manual or YouTube tutorial. Aesthetic goals address musicianship, which is the real point of studying music technology in the first place. In organizing a curriculum, it can be helpful to organize the goals into technical and aesthetic categories. This will help you identify the main “hook” for each project and decide what order to present them in. Table 6.1 lists examples of both technical and aesthetic goals; as you look over the lists, some project ideas may occur to you. Once you have a project idea worked out and you have created your own sample project, it’s time to work through it with students. Here is a sample timeline: • Session 1: Kick off the project. Do a lecture or demonstration that gets the students excited about the technique or genre they are about to learn. Have them create a session file (and name it and save it) and download the necessary files or resources. If time permits, do the first creative step. • Sessions 2 to 4: Step-​by-​step work. Here’s where you lay the foundation of the project. Lead the class through the procedural parts, starting with the most essential and homogeneous ones. If you are doing a trap project and everyone will be using 808 snares on the backbeats and hi-​hats on every sixteenth note, then this is what everyone should do first. By the end of this stage, students should have all the essential tracks and sounds in place. • Sessions 4 to 6: Personalization. This is the more exploratory part of the project, when students can come up with their own ideas. For example, in a Future Bass project, everyone’s drop section will probably sound similar, but students can put more of their personal idiosyncrasies into their intro sections. Table 6.1  Technical and Aesthetic Goals

Technical Goals

Aesthetic Goals

Adding and deleting loops

Combining loops in a way that sounds good

Using Arrangement View

Using a fade out to create a satisfying ending

Programming drumbeats

Placing kick drums to create the right stylistic feel

Recording MIDI from a controller

Creating chord progressions that only use “correct” chords

Swapping instruments

Choosing instruments that complement each other timbrally

Adding audio effects to tracks

Knowing how to make an instrument sound less awkward

Changing parameters with automation

Being able to bring out a guitar solo in the mix

Stutter editing

Using noise effects to enhance a dramatic pause

Tempo-​syncing an a cappella track

Choosing two songs to mash up that fit together well

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• Session 7: Finishing touches. The last session could include locking in the form of the song, adding special effects, or getting the mix just right. Then students should export and turn in their projects.

6.9. Deconstructing a Genre Let’s say you have noticed that trap is dominating the airwaves, and you want to build a project around it. You can begin by doing some critical listening to an iconic track from the genre, for example, Future’s “Mask Off” (2017). (You will probably want to stick to the instrumental in class due to the explicit lyrics, but be sure to listen to the full version yourself to hear how Future applies Auto-​Tune and other voice processing.) Try to identify each of the instruments and see if you can reverse-​engineer them. Is the flute sampled from a live performance, or is it a software instrument performed via MIDI? Are the backbeats played on a snare or a clap? Are the hi-​hats hand-​programmed, or are they performed with a repeater/​arpeggiator? Is the bass a sampled 808 kick or another kind of instrument? Try reconstructing the instrumental yourself and see how close you can get. You should do exercises like this in front of your students so they can understand your thought process. How might you develop your own process into a class project? Where are the opportunities for individual customization? For example, if you look up “Mask Off” on WhoSampled.com, you will learn that the flute is sampled from “Prison Song,” from the 1976 musical Selma. What other 1970s soul tracks could be good sources of trap samples? If you teach trap drum programming as a formula and then allow the students to “crate dig” their own distinctive samples, you will have a strong and satisfying project.

6.10. Universal Techniques No matter which electronic music genres you are teaching, there are a few techniques that will always be helpful.

6.10.1. Provide Default Tracks and Presets Avoid the tyranny of the blank page by providing a set of default tracks, preselected clips, instrument and effect presets, and so on. This way, students can practice making creative decisions before having to learn how to set up the basic infrastructure from scratch.

6.10.2. Add Variety Through MIDI Manipulation Students may be daunted by the idea of having to come up with multiple melodic clips. But if they can create one clip, there are several easy methods to spin out variations: keep the rhythms the same, but change the pitches; keep the pitches the same, but change the rhythms; move everything up or down to the next scale tone; displace a phrase a beat earlier or later. Professionals use these techniques all the time.

6.10.3. Scenes as Form Musical form is an abstraction. Scenes in Ableton Live are concrete. It’s easier to think in terms of a list of scenes than to think in terms of a set of abstractions.

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6.10.4. Recording to Arrangement View Making decisions about form and arrangement is really hard, even for seasoned producers. Make it intuitive and interactive by having students perform arrangements live from Session View and record them to Arrangement View. They can always edit and amend arrangements afterward, but it’s easier to have something to react to than it is to work from the dreaded blank screen.

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6.10.5. Eight-​bar Phrases At the outset, make it an ironclad rule that phrases should be eight bars long. This will always sound at least okay. Beginners will be glad for the structure, and more advanced students can exercise their ingenuity at finding different ways to fill the eight-​bar container.

6.10.6. Song Structure Get students in the habit of identifying and naming song sections early, a practice that will save them incalculable amounts of pain and frustration down the road. Color-​coding helps too, because then students can use their eyes to support their ears in identifying and evaluating the structure of their tracks.

6.10.7. Fuzzy Boundaries and Fill Bars Eight-​bar phrases sound fine, but they also get boring quickly, and if they are completely sealed off from each other, the track will sound disjointed. Students can learn to have some of the music spill across section boundaries for a more organic flow. During the measure right before a big transition, drummers typically play a “fill” to “kick in” the band on stage. Producers can create the same effect in the DAW. The bar before a big change is where students can break patterns and add sound effects, which will give their tracks a higher level of craftsmanship.

6.10.8. Making Songs End Gracefully There are three cliché endings for an electronic track: the fadeout, the abrupt stop, and the gradual dismount. Students can effortlessly make a fadeout by automating the volume of the master channel. Abrupt endings are easy, too—​they can be made a little smoother by having delay and/​or reverb on some of the tracks that can decay gently to silence after the ending. The gradual dismount is the most challenging ending, but it often sounds the best. Parts exit gradually, every bar or two bars, and the dismount should start from the bottom up, so only the melodic or textural/​ambient parts are left at the end. Students should not be afraid to let these ambient endings extend, they can often be beautiful.

6.11. The Prime Directive We love Star Trek for its optimistic vision of the future. As the crew of the Enterprise seek out new life and new civilizations, they are bound by the Prime Directive: do not interfere with the natural evolution of alien worlds (Okuda & Okuda, 2016). Starfleet officers can

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observe, but they can’t intervene, even with good intentions. The show’s writers came up with the Prime Directive in response to the disastrous effects of U.S. colonialism, especially in Vietnam and Cambodia. In many ways, the colonial mindset is still alive and well in music education. We believe that decolonizing is a core responsibility for progressive educators. We cover the political aspects of a decolonizing philosophy in Chapter 16, but decolonizing also applies to individual relationships with students. The Prime Directive means that educators should allow students’ creativity to evolve with minimal interference. Our job is to provide tools for the toolbox, along with enough scaffolding to ensure that students are able to learn to use their tools. Once students start coming up with their own ideas, teachers should back off. If a student’s project isn’t working, we have to resist the temptation to step in and “fix” it. Instead, our challenge is to give guidance that ultimately leaves creative responsibility in the student’s hands.

References Bamberger, J. (1996). Turning music theory on its ear. International Journal of Computers for Mathematical Learning, 1(1), 33–​55. Csíkszentmihályi, M. (2008). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics. Dillon, S. (2007). Music, meaning and transformation: Meaningful music making for life. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Evans, P. (2015). Motivation. In G. McPherson (Ed.), The child as musician: A handbook of musical development (2nd ed., pp. 325–​339). Oxford University Press. Finney, J. (2007). Music education as identity project in a world of electronic desires. In J. Finney & P. Burnard (Eds.), Music education with digital technology (pp. 9–​21). Bloomsbury Academic. Gates, H. L. (1988). The signifying monkey: A theory of African-​American literary criticism. Oxford University Press. Okuda, M., & Okuda, D. (2016). The Star Trek encyclopedia: A reference guide to the future. Harper Design. Papert, S. (2000). What’s the big idea? Toward a pedagogy of idea power. IBM Systems Journal, 39(3–​4), 720–​729. Papert, S. (1993). The children’s machine: Rethinking school in the age of the computer. Basic Books. Resnick, M. (2007). All I really need to know (about creative thinking) I learned (by studying how children learn) in kindergarten. In Proceedings of the 6th ACM SIGCHI conference on creativity & cognition. Association for Computing Machinery Digital Library. Resnick, M., & Rosenbaum, E. (2013). Designing for tinkerability. In M. Honey & D. Kanter (Eds.), Design, make, play: Growing the next generation of STEM innovators (pp. 163–​181). Routledge. Ruthmann, A. (2012). Engaging adolescents with music and technology. In S. Burton (Ed.), Engaging musical practices: A sourcebook for middle school general music (pp. 176–​191). Rowman & Littlefield Education. Saunders, J. A. (2010). Identity in music: Adolescents and the music classroom. Action, Criticism & Theory for Music Education, 9(2), 70–​78. Stravinsky, I. (1947). Poetics of music. Harvard University Press. Théberge, P. (1997). Any sound you can imagine: Making music/​consuming technology. Wesleyan University Press.

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7.1. Designing Projects Centered on Audio The first question many new students ask when coming into the studio is, “Do I have to sing?” They may also say, “I can’t do anything musical.” Whether you want to make them sing is up to you, but you can reassure them that getting a musical sound out of a computer is not difficult. Introductory projects should be designed to put the beginners and “nonmusicians” at ease and to give them a taste of creative success. We recommend that you start by using the music media that students are already most familiar with: audio files. This first set of projects deals mainly with the mechanics of working with recorded sound, with basic editing, and with the concept of the timeline. As the projects progress, they begin to introduce techniques beyond simply layering audio recordings in the digital audio workstation (DAW). We recommend that you save MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) sequencing for later.

7.1.1. Play, Stop, Record For the first projects, we assume that students are familiar with the icons for play, stop, and record (Figure 7.1). Even if students have interacted only with consumer-​level electronics, this is enough knowledge to build on. In Live, the familiar play, stop, and record icons are visible as soon as students start adding loops and clips to their sessions (Figure 7.2).

7.1.2. The Timeline The timeline is the main tool for creating musical structure in a DAW (Figure 7.3). Music is a time-​based art form, and being able to edit in the timeline is a core skill for would-​be producers. Students can practice using the timeline by moving, arranging, and slicing clips. They can also learn the important concept of multitracking by hearing the effect of having multiple clips play back on several tracks simultaneously. Looping is also a core DAW concept, but we do not recommend introducing this idea too early. In order to make sense out of looped clips, students must first understand the linear timeline concept, as each looped clip contains a linear waveform. Clip launchers Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0007

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Teaching Recording and Sampling with Audio Projects (a)

Figure 7.1 Standard transport controls from Ableton Live (A), Apple Music (B), YouTube (C), Spotify (D) and a washing machine (E). Most companies assume that consumers know what these icons mean already.

(b)

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(c)

(d)

(e)

like Ableton Live’s Session View or Logic Pro’s Live Looping represent loop playback with circles, but the clockwise scanning around the circle still represents the playback position within a linear audio file.

7.1.3. Recorded Audio Sound is a pressure wave in the air. Recording media transduce these tiny fluctuations in air pressure into other physical media. Gramophones have a blade attached to a thin metal diaphragm, and as air pushes on the diaphragm, the blade cuts a groove into the surface of a wax cylinder. A needle riding in that same groove pushes another diaphragm, which in turn pushes the air, and that (approximately) recreates the original sound.

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Figure 7.2

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Ableton Live makes extensive use of familiar icons. All three main transport icons appear next to each clip slot, denoting what will happen if the icon is clicked. Clicking a triangle starts playback of that clip, clicking a square stops playback of any clip in that column, and clicking a circle records into the empty clip slot. Ease of use in any app is strongly linked to the user’s familiarity with icons.

Microphones also contain small metal diaphragms attached to magnets, and as the air makes them wobble, the magnets produce electrical currents. The fluctuating voltage of these currents can be precisely stored as the depth of a groove in vinyl, as the alignment of magnetic particles embedded in tape, or as a series of ones and zeroes stored on a computer hard drive. To reproduce CD-​quality audio, you need to store 44,100 voltage readings per second, each of which consists of a string of sixteen ones or zeroes. It is strange to think that digital audio is literally just long lists of binary numbers, but that is all it is. Audio stored in the form of numbers can be effortlessly copied, reorganized, transformed mathematically, edited, and combined with other lists of numbers. Editing digital audio is not unlike editing text in a word processor, except that with digital audio you usually don’t edit a single “word” at a time, but entire “paragraphs” or “pages.” The potential of manipulating digital recordings is easily demonstrated using a few “stupid audio tricks:” loop or stutter your voice, hip-​hop DJ style; raise or lower your voice’s pitch; speed your voice up or slow it down; or reverse it. Students always get a kick out of hearing their teacher’s voice altered to sound like a child or a space alien. Here are some other manipulations that are possible with digital audio, though be advised that they are more difficult: • Removing noise or otherwise improving the sound of a low-​quality capture • Changing the rhythm of a passage • Changing a chord progression (multiple notes) • Fixing inflection of a voice

7.1.4. Basic Editing Skills You should introduce editing concepts to your students as needed, rather than all at once. For example, after students are taught how to drag clips into the timeline, someone will inevitably make a mistake and ask how to fix it: “How do I get rid of something?” “Oh no, I didn’t mean to do that!” This is when you can explain how to delete—​and then how to undo when someone immediately deletes something they didn’t mean to. Next, demonstrate how to move clips around from left to right, that is, earlier and later in the timeline.

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Figure 7.3

(a)

Progress bars from YouTube (A), SoundCloud (B), Ableton Live (C), macOS (D), and Netflix (E). Users are familiar with visual left-​ to-​right representations of the progression of time.

(b)

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(c)

(d)

(e)

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The first few projects should leave students with a grasp of the following core concepts in basic DAW functions and editing techniques:

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• Deleting clips • Moving clips • Lengthening (looping or repeating) clips • Shortening clips by removing material • Editing gaps in clips • Editing silence off the beginning and end of recordings • Copying/​pasting and duplicating clips • Zooming in and out of the timeline to reveal or hide detail • Adding and deleting tracks • Undo • Recording new audio from the microphone • Adjusting levels • Muting and soloing tracks • Adjusting individual track volume • Volume automation We introduce these topics within the first two weeks of class. Once the students have these core technical skills under their belts, they will be able to follow the steps in the more complex projects and will feel more confident about creating things on their own. The learning curve is steep but short, and students should be editing competently after the first few projects.

7.1.5.  Loops After introducing linear time, you can introduce infinite time. Clips that can repeat indefinitely are called loops. You can use loops both in linear arrangements and in nonlinear looping sessions. The audio loop is the unifying common feature of dance music and hip-​ hop (Butler, 2012, p. 35). Loop libraries are a common element of many DAWs, and the stock loops included with your software will typically be royalty-​free. You can download more royalty-​free loops and libraries from the internet as well. Most loop libraries include clips containing a single instrument sound. For example, instead of a loop of a full rock band playing an eight-​bar riff, a loop library would contain loops of various drum patterns, bass riffs, guitar riffs, and so on. You can match a drum loop from one library with a bass loop from another, then with a saxophone loop from yet another. We like to give students their first taste of songwriting/​composing by having them simply mix and match stock loops. Choose a drum loop, a synth loop, and a bass loop; now play them together, and you have the beginning of a song. Our first project in introductory-​level music tech courses is to create a full-​length song using the loop library included with GarageBand or Soundtrap and nothing else. While working with loops is easy, using loop libraries can be a challenge. Libraries are not always labeled, sorted, or categorized well. You also cannot always search them by tempo or key. Beginners often struggle to combine loops in mismatching keys. GarageBand’s entire loop library plays in C by default, but Ableton presumes greater

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Figure 7.4 Apple loops, converted to .aif format and manually tagged with key and tempo metadata. It is possible to do this automatically, but these loops were manually tagged to make them searchable from, and compatible with, multiple DAWs.

musical knowledge and independence in its users, so its loop library does less hand-​ holding. You will need to help your beginners sift through their loops, especially if the libraries are large and disorganized. You can save them (and yourself) some pain by preparing a smaller custom loop library with key and tempo information included in the file names (Figure 7.4). Ethan maintains a hand-​curated and tagged “breakbeat starter kit” for this purpose.

7.1.6. Ableton Live’s Session View Ableton Live can be confusing to new users because when you load it, the first thing you see is Session View, a nonlinear representation of clips and tracks that allows free-​form music-​making with minimal commitments (Figure 7.5). As we explained in Chapter 5, Session View is a wonderful expressive tool, but it takes some getting used to. Think of Session View as a way to start projects. In this view, the song’s structure and overall length are undetermined; instead, you place or record clips here for live performance. You cannot complete a finished song from Session View, since by definition, there is no “song” here, just a batch of song components. Once you have your clips prepared and organized, you can record yourself performing them, i.e., launching and stopping them in whatever sequence or pattern you want. This performance is written to the linear timeline of Arrangement View, where you will be able to do further editing and detailing, and then export your finished product.

7.1.7. Ableton Live’s Arrangement View Live’s Arrangement View is a more traditional DAW interface, with time flowing from left to right and tracks arranged from top to bottom (Figure 7.6). (If you are using GarageBand, you are always in “arrangement view.”) This is where your recordings from Session View end up, and where you can create a finished product. It is also perfectly

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Figure 7.5 Session View in Ableton Live.

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Figure 7.6 Arrangement View in Ableton Live.

possible to do projects in Arrangement View, without touching Session View at all. You can decide which view is best for a given project by answering these questions: • Does the project have a prescribed length or structure? For example, are you scoring a movie scene that is exactly two minutes and thirty-​seven seconds long? If so, use Arrangement View. • Does the project involve making many duplicates of the same pattern with small variations, like a drum pattern with several variants and fills? If so, use Session View, and then complete the project in Arrangement view. • Is the project entirely loop-​based? If so, use Session View, and finish in Arrangement View. • Is the project a live DJ set? If so, use Session View. It is technically possible to DJ using Arrangement View, but it is impractical for most purposes.

Reference Butler, M. (2012). Electronica, dance and club music. Ashgate.

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7.2 Project Example: Arranging Clips 7.2.1. Project Duration Two to three sessions.

7.2.2. Technical Goals • Students will understand basic transport and track controls in the DAW. • Students will learn how to use the browser to find clips and place them onto tracks. • Students will be able to add, delete, and move clips on the timeline across multiple tracks.

7.2.3. Creative Goals • Students will gain exposure to part layering. • Students will begin to explore mixing parts by adjusting volume levels. • Students will be introduced to the concept of eight-​bar phrases.

7.2.4. Listening Examples Any loop-​based electronic music will work. We like to play whatever stylistically relevant music we’ve been listening to lately while students walk into the room: current pop, golden-​age hip-​hop, 90s house classics, whatever suits the mood.

7.2.5. Before Teaching This Lesson This project is technically simple, but it entails a big conceptual leap: the idea that you can create new music simply by combining pre-​existing recordings. The conventional view of musical creativity, originating in European Romanticism, is that ideas come from “nowhere” and that they take shape through a quasi-​mystical and unknowable process. The act of auditioning and combining loops does not feel very much like our image of Beethoven writing notes with a quill pen. Students discover over the course of these projects that digital composition, performance, and audio engineering “are so interrelated that any qualitative distinction is meaningless” (Moir & Medbøe, 2015, p. 151). Audio engineer Mark Rubel said: “Recording is the pathway for ideas and dreams to get from one person to another” (quoted in Thibeault, 2012, p. 51). This is a perfect mindset for starting students on their music production journey. You can give students a smoother entry into their first projects by creating a custom default DAW session tailored to their needs. In Ableton Live, we suggest setting up the new default session as follows: • Set Live to Arrangement View. • Leave only one MIDI track and one audio track. • Add the Grand Piano instrument to the MIDI track. • Add a limiter to the Master track (optional). • Hide the track I/​O panel. • Arm the Grand Piano track.

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Go to the File/​Folder tab in Preferences and choose “Save Current Set as Default.” Now Live will open to your custom set every time. Other DAWs have similar functionality. This project requires that you have a diverse library of loops to work with. (We use the terms “loops” and “clips” interchangeably for the time being.) The libraries that come with GarageBand, Logic Pro, and FL Studio will serve you just fine. If you are using Ableton Live Intro, be sure to install the Intro-​compatible Live Packs. You should try to install all of them, but at very least one like the “Loopmasters Mixtape” pack, with a good variety of loops. It includes lots of melodic, bass, and harmony loops, whereas the default installation of Live Intro contains drum clips almost exclusively. Also note that if you have loop libraries from other DAWs, you can add them to Live’s Places section in the browser. As long as the loops are in a format Live can read (and it can read most audio formats), you will be able to use them along with Live’s built-​in clips.

7.2.6. Project Design For many students, this project will be their first experience with any kind of music-​ creation software. You want to make sure that very little can go wrong. Avoid unnecessary setup steps if you can, and check the DAW and hardware functionality thoroughly. If the gear doesn’t work, or your demos are full of awkward starts and stops, it will be discouraging for the novices. Keep your instructions simple, and spot-​check often. The first step is to expose students to the idea of dragging clips onto tracks. Give them plenty of time to listen through the various options found in the loop library, and keep lecturing to a minimum. Next, you will be presenting the concept of a two-​track session, one for drums and one for “not-​drums” (pitched instrument sounds). Most students will be intuitively able to distinguish drumlike sounds from melodic sounds like piano or guitar.

7.2.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 7.2.7.1. Session 1: DAW Basics The key for this session is to get past the DAW’s intimidation factor. We like to encourage beginners by pointing out the basic Play, Stop, and Record buttons among the transport controls: “You know how this works already!” The concept of a timeline/​progress bar is also familiar from video and music players. It’s a good idea to point out these aspects and dismiss the rest of the window as “stuff we’ll get to later.” Point students to the loop library folder(s), show them how to preview the loops, and give them a few minutes to explore. They will need to know how to adjust the overall system volume to hear the loops at a comfortable listening level, so this is a great time to show them how to do it. Next, show students how to drag clips onto tracks in the timeline (Arrangement View in Live). If your default set has MIDI/​instrument tracks, demonstrate that you will not be able to drag audio onto these tracks. Also show that by dropping a clip into an empty region of the screen, you can automatically create new audio tracks. Unlike GarageBand and Logic, Live has no global key or pitch filter for clips. You can prevent chord clashes by limiting students to combinations of one drum clip and one

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not-​drum or melodic/​chord clip at a time. Show students how to keep all of their drum material on one audio track, and all of their pitched material on the other audio track. After a bit of exploration, students will want to know how to remove unwanted clips, and how to remove unused tracks. Do a quick demo of each. Also, show how dragging on the right edge of a clip can shorten or lengthen it, and make more copies of a loop. Point out the marks at the top of the waveform that show where the loops are repeating. In Live, you should also point out that clips can be moved around and altered only by clicking and dragging the colored stripe above the waveform, not the waveform itself. That’s enough for the first day. Congratulate students on making their first song! There is no need for them to save their work; they will have no trouble starting from scratch next time. 7.2.7.2. Session 2: Saving and Mixing Have students set up a save location for their projects. Students struggle with file management more than with any other aspect of music creation—​professionals do, too! You will need to review the procedure for saving almost every time you save anything in class. In Will’s lab and Ethan’s classrooms, there are no separate user accounts on the computers, so it’s really important to set up separate student folders in the Documents folder. Whatever your setup is, it’s important that students save their work in a consistent format and location. Students should name this project “First project—​YOURNAME.” Live projects are folders,1 so make sure that nobody saves the project inside of another Live project folder. You can quickly verify this by looking at the title bar of the Live window. A correct save appears as: First Project—​YOURNAME [First Project—​YOURNAME]. If the two names don’t match, you’ll know they saved the project in the wrong place. Next, students can spend some more time adding and deleting clips. Learning by discovery is the aim here. Encourage students to find cool combinations of drum loops and not-​drum loops. This time, they should be thinking about what will work well in a song. At this point, Will shows an example of an intense synth clip playing at the same time as a relatively laid back drum loop. He asks: “What’s the matter with volume levels between these two clips?” Students will say something like, “I can’t hear the drums.” There are two solutions: turn up the drums, or (better idea) turn down the synth. Keep the volume level of each track below the “0 dB” marking on each fader. It is counterintuitive that 0 dB is usually quite loud! In general, if students need something to be louder, they should start by turning everything else down first. Be sure to demonstrate digital clipping by turning a track up way too loud. Students will quickly get the message that red on the meters is to be avoided.2 After students spend a little more time discovering good combinations for drum and not-​drum clips, take a moment to go over some of the other track controls, such as the Solo and Mute buttons. Point out these buttons to the students and have 1 Most DAWs save projects as folders containing a session file, audio assets, and other assorted files. GarageBand seems to be an exception—​its projects appear in the Finder to be single files. This is an illusion. GarageBand projects are folders, too. 2 Ethan has had some metalhead students who love the sound of digital clipping, especially on vocals. He tries to make sure that when they clip their audio, it’s because they intend to.

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Figure 7.7 Arranging Clips project with two parts in eight measure sections. “Not Drums” can be any pitched instrument.

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them play with the buttons for a bit, and then have students describe the buttons’ behavior. (This is also a good time to point out where the Help menu is—​in Live, it’s the box in the lower left corner of the screen.) You may want to temporarily add a third track to demonstrate the Solo button, but it’s not strictly necessary. Students will begin to construct an arrangement out of these “Drums” and “Not Drums” loops (Figure 7.7). 7.2.7.3. Session 3: Exporting Point out the measure number markers along the top of the timeline. Mention that a common convention in songwriting and production is to make changes every eight measures (and that cool people call them bars instead of measures). Instead of changing clips whenever they feel like it, have students make all their clip borders line up on the grid lines every eight bars. Students will need to know that the numbers will always appear as “n + 1”, so an eight measure phrase will line up with measure mark 9, a sixteen-​measure phrase will end at measure mark 17, and so on. Students should now finish their song. At this stage, aim for four eight-​bar phrases, for a minimum length of thirty-​two bars, ending at measure 33. DAWs can export full songs or subsections of a song, based on the current time selection. To help make the exporting process consistent, have students always double-​click the Stop button before exporting. This will deselect any current highlighted regions and force the DAW to export the entire timeline. In most DAWs there is an export function3. In Ableton Live, click the File menu’s Export Audio/​Video command to export your song as an audio file. Make sure students know to choose the right folder when they export material. Your particular turn-​in process will naturally vary according to your setup. Will’s class uses Google Classroom, which is a handy tool for managing submitted files. However, the mobile app has trouble playing back .aiff and .wav files, so he has students compress their files first, or directly export as MP3 files. On a Mac, you can compress audio files by right-​clicking the exported file in the Finder and selecting “Encode

3 GarageBand hides its Export function under the Share menu instead.

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selected audio files.” This creates a compressed .m4a version of the file that can be played back on any device. If, like Ethan, you use university content management systems like Canvas, you may find that you need to do the same thing.

7.2.8.  Troubleshooting Students will still be figuring out the relationship between system volume, track volume, and Master volume. There is no need to mention Master volume at all during this lesson. Instead, we suggest focusing on system volume instead. Be sure to point out that in both macOS and Windows, there is a speaker icon that indicates whether system volume is muted. If students used the search feature in their loop library earlier in the class, they will often forget about it and wonder why their libraries are empty. Simply click the X next to the search field to clear it. Students using Live will not understand exactly where to grab clips and will need one-​ on-​one demonstration of how to click and drag on the colored clip header rather than the waveform. Some students will stack every clip vertically in separate tracks, rather than making the song progress from left to right. If you see too many simultaneous tracks, ask to listen to the project and notice how “thick” it sounds. Show them how much better it sounds to keep the new material moving from left to right. Students will often try to turn in the DAW project file instead of an audio file. Ask students to preview the file in their file picker before uploading to be doubly sure they’re turning in a playable audio file instead of a session file. Ethan always has one student per semester who needs to have this repeated five or six times.

7.2.9. Differentiated Instruction Advanced students will be curious to explore the DAW at this point, and they usually do not need extra tasks to encourage them. You should not specify a definite endpoint; instead, encourage discovery learning until the third session, as students at all levels will have lots to explore. Prompt them to ask questions: “If there’s something you think you should be able to do, Live can probably do it, and I can show you how.” If students want to make a longer song, that’s fine, as long as it follows an eight-​bar phrase structure. Students who are moving fast may benefit from having some example forms to follow. Discourage them from introducing brand-​ new material every eight bars. Instead, suggest having an “A section” that recurs every eight bars in a rondo fashion (A-​B-​A-​C-​A-​D, etc.). Students can also try other methods of organizing their material, too, such as making the sections play backward from the middle in a symmetrical arch form. These little bits of musical knowledge may be too much for the class at large, but they will effectively engage the more advanced students and let them know how much depth there will be in the class. Some students will be extremely timid about experimenting with the software and will not ask questions, either. Keep an eye out for students who have no clips loaded into their project, and feel free to jump in and show them how to drag a clip in. Once you

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establish that you’re watching and that you can anticipate their problems, they will open up a bit and ask for more help.

7.2.10. During Work Time

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You need to be accessible during this project. Everything is new to the students, so walk around the room and observe them as they work. Don’t try to demonstrate everything at once. Instead, alternate between showing an example and allowing them time to explore it on their own. When it’s time to turn projects in, be sure both to thoroughly demonstrate where and how you want students to export files, and to double-​check your system. This step is a frequent pain point.

7.2.11. Assessment Strategies This is the first project, so be gentle. The goals here are simply to learn some software basics and to outline the procedure for starting and finishing a project. (See Chapter 11 for a detailed discussion of assessing lab projects.) In Chapter 11, Figure 11.1, we include Will’s generic project rubric sheet. Feel free to use it, or to make your own. Will’s sheet was designed to satisfy SLO (Student Learning Objective) guidelines, which are required in some districts. Most students should fit in the “Emerging Mastery” boxes. The most important phrase in this column is “Project was completed.” We want to provide a positive experience, not add to students’ anxiety level. 7.2.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Both drumbeats and pitched loops are present. • Entire song is exported and turned in correctly. • Bonus: Phrases are eight measures long. 7.2.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Nothing is overly quiet or loud (no clipping). • Chosen loops sound as if they want to play together. • The project is never too busy or empty-​sounding.

References Moir, Z., & Medbøe, H. (2015). Reframing popular music composition as performance-​ centred practice. Journal of Music, Technology & Education, 8(2), 147–​161. Thibeault, M. (2012). Wisdom for music education from the recording studio. General Music Today, 25(2), 49–​52.

7.3. Project Example: Unreliable Product Ad 7.3.1. Project Duration Four to five sessions.

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7.3.2. Technical Goals • Students will learn how to record on audio tracks using a microphone. • Students will edit overlapping clips in Arrangement View on multiple tracks. • Students will alter audio pitch and time as needed in their project.

7.3.3. Creative Goals • Students will balance audio levels to draw attention to spoken dialogue tracks. • Students will write an engaging, persuasive, and/​or entertaining advertisement. • Students will write a script that is easy for the listener to understand.

7.3.4. Listening Examples • Current Radio Ads pulled from broadcast stations (easy to find on YouTube) • Optional: prior student examples if you have some good ones

7.3.5. Materials Needed • Microphone (built-​in laptop mics are adequate, but external ones will sound better) • Access to a sound effects library like freesound.org

7.3.6. Before Teaching This Lesson Test your external microphones before students arrive. When you disconnect an audio interface, the computer “forgets” about it. When you reconnect it, some DAWs (e.g., GarageBand and Logic) will automatically detect it and ask if you would like to use its inputs. For others (e.g., Live), you will need to select the interface from the Audio tab of Live’s Preferences pane. It’s a good idea to spend some nonproject time explaining how recording works in a DAW. Demonstrate arming tracks, using record, playback, etc. It is also a good idea to do a quick primer on microphone technique: point the mic directly at the speaker’s mouth, use clear enunciation, set a good level, and so on. National Public Radio’s ear training guide for audio engineers (Byers, 2017) is an excellent reference for learning how to diagnose and fix common problems when recording speech. Begin the project itself by guiding students through a few example ads, drawing attention to how they sound and how they are formatted. Ask, “What does the announcer’s voice sound like?” Students will probably respond, “She sounds super loud!” or “She never takes a breath.” These observations will lay the groundwork for learning editing tricks later.

7.3.7. Project Design In his early years of teaching music technology, Will noticed that students without musical experience felt intimidated by the class. They were not confident about their ability to come up with musical ideas, and they were unfamiliar with the software. Ethan gets plenty of college-​level performance majors who feel the same way! Doing a project that is limited to voice-​over removes the pressure of making musical ideas and allows students to practice editing in the timeline.

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This project has four goals. First, students will use the familiar format of the radio advertisement to learn unmeasured editing, pacing, and mixing. Second, students will think creatively about making something customized and potentially entertaining. Third, students will get an opportunity to break out of their shells using comedy. Fourth, students will consider the line between appropriate and inappropriate humor. We recognize that this last goal is not a strictly musical issue, but it is a discussion that bears on songwriting. One of Will’s students developed a taxonomy of humor that his classes use to determine the efficacy and suitability of jokes—​see Figure 7.10. When students are writing their scripts, encourage them to invent a new product, rather than creating an ad for an existing one. The point of the project is to create good-​ sounding audio; the ad does not need to be realistic, or even to make sense. Taking a satirical approach to advertising tropes takes some pressure off, and it also invites a critical look at consumer culture.

7.3.8. Day-​by-​Day Plan 7.3.8.1. Session 1: Scripts Play through each of the example radio ads. Ask students to describe how the announcer’s voice sounds and to guess how many tracks were needed. Students should also try to guess how the ads were written in the first place. One common ad structure is to have a “problem person” and a “solution person.” Other ads spew a dizzying array of facts that may or may not be valid. Ads will frequently start with a question: “Do you wish that _​_​_​_?​ ” “Don’t you hate it when _​_​_​_​happens?” They will then answer the question with a product that’s for sale. The class should work in pairs. This will help break the ice and let the students bounce script ideas off each other. It will also make it easier for the ads to have multiple characters. Do not allow too many groups of three, as the logistics of sharing a computer are too difficult. Headphone splitters are inexpensive and are very helpful for collaborative projects. Young people get discouraged when they compare their projects to professional-​ quality work. Instead, set their expectations by playing them work by other students. The fact that they are advertising a fictional product, service, or event will help them not worry too much about sounding polished. If students need ideas, you might suggest ads for an unnecessary kitchen gadget or a pharmaceutical product with a suspiciously long list of side effects. Students should write out their dialogue verbatim, because they will be recording their scripts one line at a time (Figure 7.8). Editing separate clips for each line is easier than editing long takes. 7.3.8.2. Session 2: Dialogue Recording As students continue to write, be sure to vet their ideas. Some groups will still need help developing their concepts. Others will be well along with writing, but will need help making their idea more appropriate for school projects. Common content issues include excessive violence, making fun of a particular group of people, using inappropriate language or phrases, and overt use of body humor.

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Figure 7.8 Each line should be recorded separately, because it makes it easier to edit out empty space and to see which character is talking.

77  Once students have their scripts ready, they can start recording their dialogue. Focus only on spoken parts; save sound effects and music for later. Students should use one audio track for each character. Be sure to demonstrate how to rename audio tracks so they can label them. Now is the time to show students how to record with the microphones. Make sure that they are recording individual lines and then stopping, rather than recording the entire script in one take. 7.3.8.3. Session 3: Editing Show students how to slip clips off the grid to eliminate gaps between sentences. In Live, they can either disable Snap to Grid on the Options menu or hold the Cmd key (Ctrl on PCs) while dragging clips. Point out how the waveform inside a clip does not automatically line up with the edges of the clip. To determine where the speech begins and ends, students should be looking at the waveforms, not the clip boundaries. To attain the “fast-​ talking” effect of a radio ad, they should eliminate as much empty space between lines as possible. In other words, they should treat the clips as if each one is interrupting the previous one (Figure 7.9). Will demonstrates this idea by recording himself having a conversation with himself on two tracks: “How are you today?” “Pretty good, weather is crazy today, huh?” and so on. He shows how an unedited conversation that is thirty seconds long can easily be condensed down to fifteen seconds by eliminating pauses. Students should use editing to get the length of their ads as close to thirty seconds as they can. After they have done so, you should demonstrate how to speed up the recordings. The list of side effects from a pharmaceutical ad is the best example. In the clip details, adjust the Seg. BPM and the audio will get correspondingly slower or faster. Speeding up the audio too much results in an “auctioneer” effect, which can be funny in the right context. 7.3.8.4. Session 4: Sound Effects Once their dialogue is recorded and edited, students can add sound effects, such as transition impacts or swooshes between character lines. Some scripts will have specific needs for effects that illustrate locations or products, like chirping birds for outdoor settings. Students will be able to find almost anything they need on freesound.org. All sound effects should go on separate tracks.

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Figure 7.9 Notice how the lines overlap slightly—​this technique makes the announcer almost sound like they are interrupting themselves and eliminates “dead air” in the ad.

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Students can also add music beds—​for example, by bringing in loops from the loop library. Make sure to mix music much more quietly than the dialogue—​a good rule of thumb is to set background music at about -​30 dB. 7.3.8.5. Session 5: Finish and Export As students finish their projects, make sure that projects are roughly thirty seconds long, that they are intelligible throughout, and that they include some sound effects and/​or music. Then the class can export and turn in.

7.3.9. One-​Hour Version You can do a shorter version of this project by skipping the script-​writing phase. While this eliminates the higher-​order creative writing element, you will still be able to give the students an experience with recording and timeline editing to make something silly and fun in a short amount of time. Give students a preselected set of scripts from actual radio ads, or scripts you have written yourself. Consider a quick activity like drawing topics out of a hat, using Mad Libs-​style sheets or some other “fill in the blank” method to allow some personalization. Have them record as in Session 2 above, using one track per character. Edit by slipping the region edges over each other to make the clips interrupt one another slightly. Add music loops at low volume. If time allows, add sound effects from freesound.org. For this condensed version, ignore the thirty-​second time limit and just try to keep things short.

7.3.10.  Troubleshooting Some students will not have paid attention to your mic placement demonstration. They may speak into the wrong end of the mic, be too close or too far away, and so on.

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If you keep an eye on recording quality, students will have a better time doing creative editing later. If you are using external microphones and they get disconnected and plugged back in, you will likely encounter the problem of the computer’s not “seeing” them—​in Live, the Record Arm button will be grayed out. You can fix this for students, but also be sure to show them how to open the Preferences and choose the correct input device. Students should eventually learn to troubleshoot this issue on their own. Make sure that students are listening critically to the quality of their recordings. Are the voices audible? Is there distortion or clipping? Is the music too loud? Reiterate how to change volume, and comment on their levels often. You will be giving a lot of creative help in this lesson. If the projects sound boring, fail to mention the product name, or are simply confusing to listen to, be prepared to offer suggestions. If students need more material, they should try adding a testimonial by someone who uses the product. Some students will try to speed up their dialogue excessively. Encourage subtle adjustments—​doubling the tempo is a reasonable limit. Students will occasionally move their session file out of their project folder. This will make the audio recordings appear unlinked, and an error message will show—​in Live, an orange bar with the message “Media files are missing” will appear at the bottom of the screen. Look in the most recent save location to find the missing folder. Some students will still record the dialogue as one continuous track, even though you told them not to. Keep an eye on their screens and be ready to help them split their clips up. Students will need many reminders to be aggressive in their editing. Use visual cues to help them keep the dialogue tight: “Don’t let there be any daylight between the waveforms,” for example. Don’t be afraid to have students re-​record a line that sounds bad. There is no cure for distorted or unintelligible audio. Keep an eye on the size of waveforms during the recording phase of the project to help catch students with recording level issues before they get too far into the editing process.

7.3.11. Differentiated Instruction Advanced students will naturally spend a long time on their script. Occasionally, they will write an ad so original and interesting that you should let them run past the thirty-​ second time limit. These students are usually open to other suggestions later in the project to make their ad more elaborate and/​or professional-​sounding. Some students will have trouble coming up with an initial idea. You can assist them with brainstorming. Think in terms of problem–​solution–​example. In a mixed-​grade class, students’ maturity levels will vary widely, and you will need to be ready to screen out inappropriate content. Younger students who go “over the line” will tend to have obviously inappropriate ideas, while the older students will try to sneak in double entendres or cultural references they do not expect a teacher to catch. Your job is to immerse yourself in culture to the point that you are familiar with jokes from their age group. Let these students know that you get the joke, and

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then help them amend their project to avoid making the rest of the class feel awkward during project listening day.

7.3.12. During Work Time

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As always, be available, and silently check screens as you walk around to make sure the students are working on things the correct way. Monitor pairs of students to make sure they are dividing the work between the two of them—​some partners are “computer hogs,” while others like to sit back and let the other person do all the work for them.

7.3.13. Assessment Strategies About a week after the class turns in a project, take a day to listen to projects publicly. This project does not usually require an entire class period to listen to everyone’s work, since the ads are so short. 7.3.13.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Clarity of voice • Presence of sound effects and music beds 7.3.13.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Original ideas • Styling of voices via acting or effects • Depiction of location via sound cues • Understanding of the radio ad medium through clever use of clichés, disclaimers, or other tropes

7.3.14. The Comedy Pyramid Some teachers are hesitant to allow free-​flowing humor in school projects because students sometimes use humor as a way of testing boundaries within a strict system. One of Will’s students developed a system for determining if a joke was going to be effective or offensive that became a useful guide during projects like this one. Figure 7.10, “Understanding Comedy,” is the Drake Road Productions style guide document written by Ella Hickman, Lebanon High School class of 2016. Jokes at the bottom of the figure are funny to everyone, if a little basic. Jokes at the top are funny to a very small audience. Jokes in the middle are usually not effective and are often more offensive than funny. Satire involves mockery, but students should avoid mockery of people who are less powerful or less privileged than they are. It’s funnier and more relatable to have the powerless tease the powerful than vice versa. Physical humor is almost always relatable. Jokes that rely on in-​group knowledge can be fun for the in-​ group but will exclude everyone else.

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Figure 7.10 “Understanding Comedy,” a useful tool for telling how and why a joke might be funny, written by Ella Hickman. “Good Morning LHS” is Lebanon High School’s morning news and announcements show, and “Team TV” is the monthly comedy/​ entertainment and student life show.

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Reference Byers, R. (2017). The ear training guide for audio producers. NPR Training. training.npr.org/​ 2017/​01/​31/​the-​ear-​training-​guide-​for-​audio-​producers/​

7.4. Project Example: Simple Remix 7.4.1. Project Duration

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Three to four sessions.

7.4.2. Technical Goals • Students will gain experience beat matching and changing tempo of clips from “real-​ world” songs. • Students will transpose clips to match keys. • Students will use locators to mark form sections in an existing song.

7.4.3. Creative Goals • Students will alter the musical feel of an existing song. • Students will apply conventions found in pop verse-​and-​chorus structure to their own musical ideas. • Students will adjust musical texture to match the emotional content of song sections.

7.4.4. Listening Examples • Eric B. & Rakim, “Paid in Full” (1987)/​Eric B. & Rakim, “Paid in Full” [The Coldcut Remix] (1987) • Björk, “All Is Full of Love” (1997)/​Björk, “All Is Full of Love” [video mix] (1999) • Danger Mouse, The Grey Album (2004) [Warning: Explicit language] • Todd Terje, “Diamonds Dub (Tangoterje Edit)” (2006)/​Paul Simon, “Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes” (1986) • Imaginary Cities, “Bells of Cologne” (2013)/​Porter Robinson, “Hear the Bells” [feat. Imaginary Cities] (2014)/​Porter Robinson, “Hear the Bells” [Electric Mantis Remix, feat. Imaginary Cities] (2014) • Portugal. The Man, “Feel It Still” (2017)/​Portugal. The Man, “Feel It Still” [Medasin Remix] (2017) • Lizzo, “Juice” (2019)/​Lizzo, “Juice” [Breakbot Mix] (2019)

7.4.5. Before Teaching This Lesson The word “remix” literally means “to mix again.” A remix was originally a new version of a multitrack recording in which the separate instrumental or vocal tracks were rebalanced, and sometimes re-​edited (Gunkel, 2016, p. 15). Over the course of dance music history, remixes came to involve radical transformation of their source material. When remixers change the style of a track, the differences matter in a particular taste community (Michielse & Partti, 2015). The idea of putting a personal spin on a well-​known existing work did not originate with digital remixing; it has been long-​standing practice in genres

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like folk, jazz, and blues. Also, remixes need not always be musical. Seth Grahame-​Smith remixed Jane Austen in his book Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2009). If a song is interesting to remix, then it is almost certainly under copyright. Remixes created in classrooms have ambiguous legality at best. Why should you encourage students to potentially ignore or violate copyright law? Matthew Thibeault (2012) gave two reasons. First, in real life, producers create remixes first and then seek clearances afterward (and then only if they have commercial potential). Second, there is simply no way to teach electronic music creation in a culturally relevant way without using copyrighted material. Eduardo Navas (2012) described four types of remixes. Extended remixes are longer versions of the original track that add instrumental or breakdown sections to make the track easier for club DJs to mix. The first disco song to be extended this way was “Ten Percent” by Double Exposure, remixed by Walter Gibbons in 1976. Selective remixes add or subtract material from the original track. One of the first commercially successful and popular selective remixes was Eric B. & Rakim’s “Paid in Full,” remixed by Coldcut in 1987. In reflexive remixes, the remixed version challenges the “spectacular aura” of the original and claims autonomy even when it carries the name of the original. The idea here is to change a song’s style or meaning while still keeping it recognizable. An example of this is Mad Professor’s album No Protection (1995), a dub remix of Massive Attack’s trip-​hop album Protection (1994). Finally, in regenerative remixes, the only similarity between the “original” and the “remix” is the title. Distinguishing between an “original” and a “remix” can be complicated in the electronic music world. Björk’s song “All Is Full of Love” was originally written and recorded as a trip-​hop ballad. However, she did not include this version on her 1997 album Homogenic, deciding instead to include a wildly abstract ambient remix of the track by Howie B. She did not release the original version until two years later. As a result, most Björk fans hear the remix as the “original.” Unauthorized remixing has a political aspect. Remixers are taking the products of the commercial music industry and turning them into raw material for participation and musical imagination. In so doing, they give the products new meaning. Remixers cease to be consumers and instead become producers. That is a uniquely empowering act (Order et al., 2017, p. 300). Remixing can support the ability to imagine alternatives, to learn flexibility, to become tolerant of uncertainty, and to enjoy the unknown. This lesson requires extensive preparation. Making a typical remix from an acapella4 vocal track usually consists of the following steps: 1. Obtain an acapella (unaccompanied) vocal track of the song you want to remix. 2. Identify the tempo of the song in beats per minute (BPM) and set your DAW’s metronome to match. If the vocal was not recorded to a click, then you will probably need to time-​stretch/​warp it to conform it exactly to the tempo. 3. Identify the key of the song. 4. Identify the song sections (verses, choruses, etc.). 5. Make creative decisions regarding the new production you would like to use for the song. 6. Make any small edits to the vocals that support the vision of the remix (stutters, chops, cuts, etc.). 4 An unaccompanied vocal performance is “a cappella,” but an unaccompanied vocal track is an “acapella.”

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Figure 7.11 A folder of prepped a cappella tracks.

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Step 1 is just an internet scavenger hunt; if an acapella track exists, you can quickly locate it using Google. Steps 4, 5, and 6 stick closely to the technical skills we have already addressed and do not require significant prior knowledge. However, steps 2 and 3 are much more advanced. Without a strong music background, students will have trouble figuring out the tempo and key of a song. Learning how to warp out an acapella track is an advanced skill, and teaching it to novices is arduous and time consuming. You can eliminate steps 2 and 3 in your project by preparing acapella tracks and labeling them with their correct key and tempo (Figure 7.11). Advanced students can try prepping their own tracks, but only after experiencing a successful remix process first. Restricting the class to prepared acapella tracks may limit their freedom of choice, but it does not limit their ideas for what to do with those acapella vocals. Students can use or subvert the familiarity of well-​known songs when they add their own material. If you need to save yourself even more labor, assign a single acapella track to everyone in the class. This will take pressure off less-​confident students who are overwhelmed by too many choices (Order et al., 2017), and it has pedagogical value, too. If everyone is working from the same acapella track, then you can clearly compare everyone’s completed projects, and a particularly creative remix will stand out more dramatically.

7.4.6. Project Design This project can vary in length depending on how deep you want to go with various elements of the remix. If you limit students to prerecorded loops, the project will be quick and easy. The project really only has two steps: prepare the vocal track and add things to it. You should do the preparation step, which is purely technical and not particularly creative. Students without a strong music background will probably not be able to

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tempo-​align vocals at all, at least not without extensive assistance on your part. We do not think that doing so is a good use of class time. We assume that you can identify beats and key centers, and that you are able to obtain acapella tracks. If you are not sure where to start, try doing a Google or YouTube search for “studio acapella.” You will find plenty of DJ-​ready examples to choose from. You can also subscribe to various services that supply DJs with instrumentals and acapella tracks of pop hits. There are two kinds of acapellas, those where the tempo is perfectly steady (because it was recorded to a click or drum loop), and those where the tempo varies (because it was recorded with human accompanists). It is safe to assume that any pop or rock song recorded after 1990 will have an unvarying tempo. In either case, we recommend that you also obtain the full version of the song. The easiest way to tempo-​align an acapella is to determine the tempo of the full song and then label the acapella file with the same tempo. Here is a recommended method for tempo-​aligning an acapella in Ableton Live. Place the acapella on an audio track in Arrangement View. Place the full song on another track. Activate the metronome. Double-​click the title of the acapella clip to show details in the bottom panel. Listen to the vocal and find a word that occurs on a downbeat—​not according to the project timeline, but in the original recording. Find the small mark right above this word. Double-​click the mark to add a warp marker. Then right-​click the warp marker and select “Set 1.1.1 here.” Now you should be able to play back the clip and at least hear the metronome start in the right place. It may still be too slow or too fast, and it might not start at the very beginning of the song, either. We will fix this next. • Set the first boxed number under the Start label. Use your down arrow to back up the starting point of the song in whole measure increments to the point (or close to the point) where the song is supposed to start. If the song starts on a beat other than beat 1, edit the file so that it starts on a downbeat, either by cutting the intro or by adding silence to the beginning. You want students to line up the vocal stem at 1.1.1. and have everything align. • If the song sounds like it’s already in time with the metronome, but the speed sounds different than the original song, check the Seg. BPM number. This is the clip’s internal tempo. Try setting Live’s global tempo (top left of the window) to match this number and see if that fixes the problem. It is okay to round the number to the nearest whole number. For example, if Seg. BPM says 139.94, go ahead and set the global tempo to 140. • If the song sounds totally out of sync with the metronome, right-​click the marker you added at 1.1.1 and choose “Warp from here.” • If the vocal is from a song whose tempo drifts (which is likely for songs recorded before 1990) then you will need to correct for that. Manually position words later in the song as needed. Once the vocal is aligned rhythmically, you can determine its key. It is not important that you do this “correctly” in a music-​theoretical sense. The main thing is to find a scale that matches. Sometimes using the “wrong” key center can sound good. For example, David Bowie’s “Starman” (1972) is in F major, but Ethan has made remixes of it in D minor, C Mixolydian mode, G Dorian mode, and A Phrygian mode, and all of them sound terrific.

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When you have the key and tempo and the song is aligned to the grid, export the acapella track as an audio file. Include the tempo and key in the file name.

7.4.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 7.4.7.1. Session 1: Choose the Song and Get It in Sync Get started by explaining what a remix is and play a few examples. By our definition, a simple remix uses the original vocals but different background music. If you like, you can compare remixes to mashups and samples, or you may prefer to jump straight into the project. Distribute acapella tracks and have students choose which one they want to work with. In Live, use Arrangement View for this project, since the acapella file determines the length and structure of the track in advance. Students should make sure that the acapella is placed on the far left side of the timeline window. In Live, they should also use the Clip details to turn off Warp, and make sure the Start marker is set to 0.0.0 (Figure  7.12). Finally, they should set the project tempo to match the tempo you specified in the acapella’s filename. Turn on the metronome and make sure it is clicking along correctly with the acapella track. Next, you will need to make sure that the acapella will stay lined up if the session tempo is changed. In Live, the easiest way to do so is to select the entire acapella file, Ctrl-​ click it, and select Consolidate. This duplicates the entire track and automatically sets warp markers in the correct places (Figure 7.13). Now, if students change the session tempo, the acapella track will stay lined up. Students will quickly discover that even small tempo changes will have noticeable effects on the mood of the song, sometimes humorous ones. They will also discover that very extreme tempo changes will introduce time-​stretching artifacts. Under Live’s Clip details, set the Warp Mode to Complex Pro for best results.

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Figure 7.12 An “unwarped” audio clip in Live. The original song was recorded at 140 BPM. If the global tempo of this project is set to 140 BPM, the audio will align with the metronome. If the global tempo is any other value, the audio will not be in sync.

Figure 7.13 A warped clip, created by Consolidating a clip after it has been manually brought into sync with the global tempo. The original speed of this song was 140 BPM. If the global tempo is changed, the audio will speed up or slow down to match it.

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Some students will finish these introductory steps quickly, while others will need one-​on-​one help. The important thing to remember is that you are trying to progress quickly to the creative and satisfying part, and it is not necessary that students internalize the technical details yet. 7.4.7.2. Session 2: Mark up the Song and Start Remixing Before students get too far along adding material to their song, review some basic song form elements that they are likely to encounter (Table 7.1). Students should be original and creative, but they will get the best results if they are attentive to the structure of the original song. Students can map out the structure by slicing up the acapella and labeling and/​or color-​coding the segments, or by placing markers in the timeline. 7.4.7.3. Sessions 3 to 4: Filling out the Song Now that students have a synchronized acapella track and a basic formal analysis, they can confidently add parts. Encourage students to alter the tempo of the track to make it sound distinct from the original version. They should choose a tempo that makes sense for their target genre: 140 BPM for techno, 120 to 130 BPM for house, and so on. Drums are the easiest place to start, since any loop will fit with any acapella track. Melodic clips are more challenging. Students can use pre-​existing loops if they are tagged with the correct key, although that will probably require more work on your part. (GarageBand has the advantage here, because all loops will automatically be transposed to fit the specified key of the project.) Students can also play their own Table 7.1.  Common Song Sections in pop music

Song Section

Formal Definition

Other Characteristics

Verse

Same melody each time, with different lyrics.

Usually not the loudest or most energetic part of the song. The lyrics often tell a story and give details to support the emotional payoff in the chorus.

Chorus

Same melody and lyrics each time.

Usually the loudest and most energetic part of the song, with a denser instrument texture than the verses. Lyrics describe the emotional impact of the verse and often include the title of the song.

Bridge/​Breakdown

Happens once. Different lyrics, melody, and texture from previous sections.

New musical material: a featured guest, rap verse, guitar solo, new texture or simply just a new rhythm in the singing.

Intro/​Outro

Music before the lyrics/​after the lyrics.

Possibly includes fade in/​out, producer tags, improv vocals, etc.

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Figure 7.14 Synchronized a cappella track (top) with accompanying drums and synths. Locators along the top are used to denote section changes.

88  accompanying parts via MIDI, but this is more complex and will require at least one or two additional sessions. We suggest that you introduce the MIDI method later as its own project. Students should add at least one drum part in each section of the song, as well as at least one melodic/​pitched part. Make sure that the verses sound similar to the other verses, that the choruses sound similar to the other choruses, and so on. The easiest way to accomplish this is to have students copy and paste the same material across each like-​ named section (Figure 7.14). Then they can introduce slight variations: for example, the second chorus might use the same parts as the first chorus, but with an additional percussion part. 7.4.7.4. Session 5: Finishing Touches Once the entire song has new backing material, show students the Fuzzy Boundaries chapter of Making Music: 74 Creative Strategies for Electronic Music Producers by Dennis DeSantis (2015)—​Will usually puts a copy of the book under his document camera. Playing around with the formal boundaries of sections will be an important skill going forward, to avoid the obvious “all tracks changing at once” sound. Have students edit their tracks by playing around with section boundaries, and by making subtle edits to the audio tracks in their arrangements. Students can add more musical interest by deleting single drum hits or notes at section boundaries, by stutter editing the vocal, or by adding audio effects. We address audio effects directly in the Soundscape project in Chapter 9, but if students want to experiment with them now, they should go ahead. Once the track is sufficiently mind-​blowing, Select All, Export, and turn in.

7.4.8.  Troubleshooting 7.4.8.1. Nothing Sounds Good in My Song This is usually because something went wrong during the initial setup of the acapella track. If the acapella isn’t in sync with the metronome, nothing will match the song. In Live, check to see that Warp is engaged. If it isn’t, the student forgot to consolidate before changing the tempo of the song. If it isn’t obvious how to fix this right away, just drag in a fresh copy of the acapella file and do the steps yourself to get it in sync. The goal here is to have students be able to create a satisfying remix, not to master the technical details.

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7.4.8.2. I Can’t Hear the Vocals Anymore/​The Vocals Are Too Loud As students add more musical material, the vocals can easily be drowned out. Remind the entire class that they should pay attention to mixing, using the track volumes to balance things out. It is generally better to turn backing tracks down, rather than to keep turning the vocal up. Live defaults to having all volume faders at 0 dB, which is counterintuitively quite loud; we suggest immediately turning all new tracks down to –​6 or –​12 dB to leave headroom.

7.4.9. Differentiated Instruction Advanced students, especially those who like to finish work as quickly as possible to teacher specifications, may finish the minimum requirements of this project earlier than other students. This is a good opportunity to refocus the course goal for them: encourage them to explore creative possibilities and to make something that they themselves would want to listen to (instead of just trying to meet your guidelines). Encourage the use of audio effects, stutter editing, and other creative tricks to give their project a unique sound. Students usually do not fall behind in this project, because it is designed to be very accessible. If a student is struggling, it is usually due to a technical error in the tempo alignment phase early in the project.

7.4.10. During Work Time The early part of this project is the most important time for the teacher to walk around the room and check students’ work. Once acapella tracks are synced, students should be free to work without interruption. Toward the end of the project, ask them to let you listen and give comments, or they can test out their project on their peers (this is an option, not a requirement).

7.4.11. Assessment Strategies 7.4.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • The song is correctly beat-​matched, i.e., the tempo does not drift as the song plays. • The song is accompanied by at least one drum loop and one pitched loop. • Form sections sound similar: verses sound like other verses, choruses sound like other choruses, etc. 7.4.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Part and clip selection sounds intentional—​grooves match the intended style or genre. • Tempo has been altered to suit the new style of the song and to strengthen the overall groove. • The song has been transformed in interesting, original, and creative ways through addition of parts and other editing techniques (stutter edits, sound effects, etc.).

7.4.12. Making This Project Your Own This project can easily be customized via the selection of acapellas, loops, and samples you provide to your students. Consider their regional and ethnic identities in your choices—​ for example, they may want acapellas in languages other than English.

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While we present this as a beginner project, remixing can also become as advanced as you want to make it. For example, beyond adding a few stutters, it is possible to use more active vocal editing to drastically alter the character of the song, or even to turn it into an entirely new one. It is particularly easy to chop vocals using Ableton Live’s Simpler instrument. Simply drag the acapella file into a new Simpler track and click the “Slice” button to choose Slicing playback mode. The slices can now be played back via a MIDI controller. If you are using the Push, the pads will automatically show a 64-​note drum grid, with each pad playing a different segment of the lyrics. Activate the Repeat button and experiment with the pitch bend strip to obtain an effect similar to turntable scratching. This works well for filling in empty sections, or for replacing a chorus with an EDM-​style drop.

References DeSantis, D. (2015). Making music: 74 creative strategies for electronic music producers. Ableton AG. Grahame-​Smith, S. (2009). Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Quirk Books. Gunkel, D. J. (2016). Of remixology: Ethics and aesthetics after remix. MIT Press. Michielse, M., & Partti, H. (2015). Producing a meaningful difference: The significance of small creative acts in composing within online participatory remix practices. International Journal of Community Music, 8(1), 27–​40. Navas, E. (2012). Remix theory—​The aesthetics of sampling. AMBRA Verlag. Order, S., Murray, L., Prince, J., Hobson, J., & de Freitas, S. (2017). Remixing creativity in learning and learning of creativity: A case study of audio remix practice with undergraduate students. Asia Pacific Media Educator, 27(2), 298–​310. Thibeault, M. (2012). From compliance to creative rights in music education: Rethinking intellectual property in the age of new media. Music Education Research, 14(1), 103–​117.

7.5. Project Example: Picking Apart a Multitrack 7.5.1. Project Duration Three to four sessions.

7.5.2. Technical Goals • Students will learn to distinguish the components of a typical pop or dance track. • Students will learn to aurally isolate these elements in a mixed-​down track. • Students will practice simple mixing.

7.5.3. Creative Goals • Students will practice “listening like a producer.”

7.5.4. Listening Examples Major artists rarely release multitracks or stems officially, and when they do, it is typically on a limited-​term basis, for the duration of a remix contest or the like. The most widely available sets of officially released stems as of this writing include the entire debut album by 100 gecs (2019), several sets released by Nine Inch Nails (2019), and “Space Oddity”

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by David Bowie (1969). For other current artists, the best bet is simply to search the internet for “official multitracks.” A much larger variety of multitracks is available unofficially, i.e., illegally; we discuss this issue below. While (legal) full multitracks are rare, isolated vocal stems (acapellas) of recent songs are far more widely available, since they are often released along with the instrumental track for use by DJs. Here, again, a Google search for “official acapella” is a good way to source these tracks.

7.5.5. Before Teaching This Lesson People often use the terms “multitracks” and “stems” interchangeably. However, they are not the same thing (Nichols, 2017). Properly speaking, multitracks are all of the tracks that comprise a song recording: every microphone and instrument input, every overdub, every effects track. In a contemporary pop song, there may be dozens or even hundreds of individual tracks. For example, standard methods for recording rock drum kits use as many as fifteen microphones, each of which records to its own track. Because multitracks are so unwieldy, they are often packaged into subgroups called stems. A drum stem might include all of the mic inputs from the drum kit, along with any additional handclaps, percussion, or samples. A keyboard stem might include piano, organ, synthesizers, and so on. A vocal stem will include all of the harmony parts, doubles, and ad libs. Engineers frequently create packs of stems as an intermediate step in mixing, and to facilitate official remixes. Typically, these packs include six to eight stems. When you see references to “multitracks” online, they are usually referring to stems. Stems and multitracks are highly desirable for remixers (and music technology educators). As a result, many sets are in circulation illegally online. Most of these were sourced from the Rock Band and Guitar Hero games—​each song that appears in these games is stored in stem format, and hackers have found ways to extract them. (Employees of the game companies are rumored to have posted stems online as well.) For example, stems to 50 songs used in Harmonix’s 2009 game Beatles: Rock Band are easy to find through Google searches. There are also many freely available sets of stems and multitracks that you can obtain from legitimate sources. For example, Cambridge Music Technology (n.d.) hosts a large collection of free and legal multitracks, including a variety of classical and other non-​ pop genres. However, aboveboard resources rarely include “name brand” artists or songs. Sadly, the choice is usually between culturally significant but illegal stems and legal but anonymous/​generic stems. Whatever set of multitracks or stems you choose to use, you will naturally want to listen through them yourself. You will also probably need to relabel them, since they are often labeled with arcane abbreviations—​“gtr” for guitar, “vox” for vocals, “kbds” for keyboards. For each set, create a DAW session; this way, you can easily mute and solo tracks, perform quick mixes, label and color-​code tracks, and mark off song sections. Multitracks and stems are a great tool for teaching a critical skill: listening like a producer. Students need to practice listening below the musical surface and identifying the many components that work together to make up a song. In electronic music and contemporary pop, most of the creative effort lies in shaping the sound itself: the design of the individual instrument sounds, their layering and combination, their relative

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loudness, and their location in musical space. This aspect of music production is more similar to classical orchestration than to composition. The best way to learn the complex processes of production is to listen critically to recordings. This is the kind of listening that students will be doing in the course of making their own music: close and analytical attention coupled with aesthetic judgments. As Eirik Askerøi and André Viervoll (2017) pointed out, “Constant evaluation is a crucial part of the recording process—​an evaluation that is necessarily based on emotional response. . . . Musical listening is the ability to listen to a recording and through that listening dissect a production into parts, both musically and technically, and at the same time maintain a focus on the aesthetics of the production as a whole” (p. 232). The ability to focus on individual sounds in a mixed-​down track is a skill that requires lots of practice. You can help students do it by playing them sounds in isolation and then comparing them to the full mix. You can also give students valuable mixing practice by having them work with pre-​existing stems before they begin to mix their own projects. The critical listening portion of this project is inspired in large part by Bill Moylan’s book, Understanding and Crafting the Mix: The Art of Recording (2007). The book is a thorough and highly technical description of studio practice in the analog era, with many examples drawn from the Beatles. While the book’s content is not directly applicable to electronic music production, Moylan’s listening exercises transfer well to any recorded music idiom. He recommends creating detailed graphs of every aspect of the sound: the instruments and other sound sources, along with their entrances and exits; the spatial placement of the sounds, both in the stereo image and how far away they are perceptually; and the relative loudness of each sound, both actual and perceptual. This is far more detail than you should expect of high school students, or most college students for that matter. You should pick and choose the aspects you think are most important to focus on. You might ask students simply to list the sounds they hear in the order they hear them, or to draw a picture of the sonic space they hear the sounds inhabiting.

7.5.6. Project Design There are three stages in this project: (1) guided listening to one or more sets of multitracks or stems, (2) having students create their own mix, and (3) having students conduct a critical listening analysis of a mixed-​down track. We leave it to you to locate and choose sets of multitracks or stems that will best suit your students’ needs and your own. We have used both iconic pop classics and unknown songs, and they each have pros and cons. Students are always excited to get to peek behind the curtain of a famous song. However, for mixing purposes, unfamiliar songs are often better. Students won’t be fighting their sense of how the mix “should” sound, and that open-​endedness matches the experience of mixing their own tracks. The guided listening portion is a teacher presentation that takes the place of the usual tech demo. You can either spend the entire session on a very close listen to a single song’s multitracks or move more quickly through several sets, depending whether you prefer depth or breadth. For the mixing project, you should choose a single set of stems for everyone to work with, both because prepping stems is time-​consuming and because it enables you to do apples-​to-​apples comparisons of everyone’s mixes. We also recommend that you create a

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DAW session in advance with all of the stems imported into it and labeled. In Live, be sure to turn off warping for all of the audio files! The critical listening component is also variable. You can allow students to choose any song to maximize their personal investment. Alternatively, you can give a list of choices, songs selected from different styles or eras. Finally, if you prefer to have students work outside their comfort zones, you can simply assign them songs to analyze. You do not need to do this part of the project during class time at all; Ethan usually assigns it as homework, since it does not require any special equipment or software. You can have students submit the results to you in writing, or have them give short presentations to the class. Finally, you have many choices about how deep or intensive the analysis needs to be; we discuss this below.

7.5.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 7.5.7.1. Session 1: Guided Listening Play through the full multitrack mix one time in its entirety, asking students to listen as they normally would. Then solo each track or stem and play through them one at a time. You will probably not need to do this from beginning to end for each track; play enough for students to get the idea. If the track is a background part (bass, backing vocals, quieter keyboards, or guitar parts), then do A/​B comparisons between the isolated part and the full mix—​students should notice the background elements “pop out” of the mix once they are conscious of their presence. Also, try playing the full mix with individual tracks muted, so students can hear the effect of their absence. Ethan likes to do this exercise with “Beat It” by Michael Jackson (1982). The guitar parts are immediately apparent to the casual listener. However, the song also contains a wide variety of keyboards and synthesizers, most of which are subtle background elements. Students never notice them at all on the first listen, but once they hear them soloed, they are amazed that they could ever have missed them. Also, if you mute the keyboard stem, the song feels remarkably flat and lifeless. The drum stems are also quite interesting, because the song contains both a drum machine track and a live drum kit, played by Jeff Porcaro of Toto. Both parts are EQ’d extremely, with all the high end filtered out of the drum machine and the low end filtered out of the kit. They sound peculiar in isolation, but they fit together like puzzle pieces. 7.5.7.2. Sessions 2 to 3: Mixing Distribute stems and lay out the ground rules. For simplicity, have students use only the volume faders and panning controls. More advanced or adventurous students might also try using automation, effects, or audio editing to customize their mix. If you allow a more interventionist approach, it’s a great opportunity to discuss the ever-​blurrier line between mixing and remixing. You can explain that while the job of the mix engineer was historically just to put a final polish on an otherwise complete piece of music, mixers now often have the freedom to reshape the finished product, structurally as well as sonically. If you have time during class, have students play short excerpts of their mixes for one another. The natural time to do this is at the end of the session, once everyone is finished, but you might consider doing it at the halfway point as well. Students who are

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more timid or uncertain how to approach the project will find valuable inspiration in their peers’ approach. 7.5.7.3. Session 4: Production Analysis

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Ask students to choose a song (unless you are assigning them one) and write a description of its sound sources. These might include voices, instruments (acoustic or electronic), and samples. Students should be as specific as they can. If there are multiple voices, are they different singers, or overdubs of the same singer, or both? Do the instruments sound “real” or “fake”? Students will not be able to identify every instrument by name, but they should try to describe them subjectively. Do any of the sounds have conspicuous special effects or processing on them? Which are mixed loudest? Where do they seem to be located in space? Are they close or far away? Are they panned left, right, or center? 7.5.7.4. Session 5: Production Analysis Presentations Having students present their analyses is optional, but if you have time, students always benefit from practicing their presenting skills. Also, they will find it interesting and inspiring to consider the production of a variety of songs. Ask the presenters to play only sections of the song rather than the entire thing, and to keep their explanations under five minutes.

7.5.8.  Troubleshooting Students may accidentally mute or solo tracks, but otherwise there is not much that can go wrong technically with their mixes. You should be on the lookout for aesthetic problems, such as clipping, or inaudible or wildly unbalanced mixes. If students say they keep turning something up but they still can’t hear it, remind them to turn everything else down instead.

7.5.9. Differentiated Instruction The mixing project is highly variable. You can have students create “quick and dirty” mixes in an hour, or have them spend several sessions doing multiple rounds of refining their mixes and critiquing one another’s mixes as well. Naturally, there are trade-​offs involved. On the one hand, real-​world mix sessions are incredibly long and detail-​oriented, and you may feel that it is important for students to experience how demanding and meticulous the process is. On the other hand, teenagers rarely have the attention span or patience of professional mix engineers, and you may decide that the quick and dirty method gives enough of the general idea. The production analysis is variable. You may want to impose constraints: something from the past ten years, something from the past thirty years, etc. You may also want to exercise veto power over anything that is too simple: singer-​songwriters backed only with acoustic guitar, unadorned guitar-​bass-​drums arrangements, or other excessively simple or uninteresting productions. You may choose to include a research aspect: have students search online for the names of the producer and engineers, information on where and when the song was recorded, who the personnel were, what equipment they used, and so on. If the song is well known, there may be a great deal of background information on its production available—​or there may be none at all! If a song has been documented very thoroughly (for example, anything by the Beatles), you should have students do their own analysis before they read the reference materials.

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7.5.10. During Work Time Everyone has a preferred mixing methodology: working from the drums upward, working from the vocals downward, turning everything all the way down and then bringing individual tracks up one at a time, or simply moving the faders improvisationally and haphazardly until you stumble on a good combination. You can offer tips and tricks to students in advance, or save your advice for when they get stuck or frustrated. Some students will just set the faders randomly and announce they are finished; you will need to gently prod them into paying more attention. There will also be a few perfectionists who will never be satisfied with their mix; for them, you can offer a version of Paul Valéry’s maxim: Mixes are never completed, only abandoned.

7.5.11. Assessment Strategies 7.5.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • For mixes: sounds are balanced well, everything is audible, and the mix is not clipping. • If panning is included in the assignment: sounds are distributed thoughtfully across the stereo image. • For production analyses: all of the sound sources and instruments are accounted for and named/​described accurately, and all other required information is included. 7.5.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • For mixes: if students have made extreme choices (e.g., mixing some sounds very quietly or muting them altogether), assess whether these choices are successful. • If panning is included in the assignment, assess whether it is logical (e.g., if sounds are hard-​panned, there is a creative justification). • For production analyses: if you asked for a chart or graphic, it is presented attractively and clearly.

7.5.12. Making This Project Your Own If you have students who are in a band or who make beats and produce, they may have their own stems available. It can be very exciting for students to work on music created by their peers. If you have friends who are working on a recording project, you might present their tracks, or better yet, have them do the presenting. And if you produce your own music, you might choose to show it as well. This project can also be adapted to include a prescribed “to-​do list” of mixing tasks, or involve the repair of an intentionally poorly recorded mix.

References 100 gecs. (2019). 1000 stems. 1000stems.com Askerøi, E., & Viervoll, A. (2017). Musical listening: Teaching studio production in an academic institution. In G. D. Smith, Z. Moir, M. Brennan, S. Rambarran, & P. Kirkman (Eds.), The Routledge research companion to popular music education (pp. 231–​242). Taylor & Francis.

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Cambridge Music Technology. (n.d.). The “Mixing Secrets” [free multitrack download library]. cambridge-​mt.com/​ms/​mtk/​ Moylan, W. (2007). Understanding and crafting the mix: The art of recording. Taylor & Francis. Nichols, P. (2017). Stems and multitracks: What’s the difference? izotope.com/​en/​learn/​stems-​ and-​multitracks-​whats-​the-​difference.html Nine Inch Nails. (2019). Multitrack sources. ninremixes.com/​multitracks.php

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7.6. Project Example: Custom Cover Song 7.6.1. Project Duration Five to ten sessions, at individual pace.

7.6.2. Technical Goals • Students will use pre-​existing material to cover or remake a song using parts that they generate. • Students will learn how to create a guide track for recording parts in sync with the metronome. • Students will use MIDI tracks to extract melody and chord information from existing songs.

7.6.3. Creative Goals • Students will be able to repurpose material from other tracks into their own covers or original works. • Students will use guide tracks to create their own matching or reharmonized backing tracks. • Students will begin to think of existing musical works as a starting point for their own creative goals, rather than as being fixed and immutable.

7.6.4. Listening Examples We consider these covers to be as interesting than the originals, if not more so. • Björk, “It’s Oh So Quiet” (1995); Betty Hutton cover • The Fugees, “Killing Me Softly” (1996); Roberta Flack cover • The White Stripes, “Jolene” (2000); Dolly Parton cover • Johnny Cash, “Hurt” (2002); Nine Inch Nails cover • Sharon Jones and the Dap-​Kings, “This Land is Your Land” (2005); Woody Guthrie cover • CHVRCHES, “It’s Not Right But It’s Okay” (2012); Whitney Houston cover • Bleachers, “All My Heroes” (2017); Moog Sound Lab version

7.6.5. Before Teaching This Lesson The most important step in this project is to create a guide track (sometimes called a cheater or scratch track), even if it is eventually muted or deleted. It is essential that the guide track be beat-​matched correctly to the session’s global tempo. Students should have

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a basic familiarity with sampling before attempting to sync an entire song to the metronomic grid. It takes plenty of trial and error to detect and correct tempo drift. You must be thoroughly comfortable with tempo matching and warping to help students synchronize their guide tracks.

7.6.6. Overview of the Technique This is less of a lesson or project and more of a technique that certain students will want to try. The technique is related to, and an extension of, the simple remix project (Chapter 7.4) and the sampling project (Chapter 9.8). While not all students will see the usefulness of this technique, it can be a valuable jumping-​off point for their final “design your own” projects, as well as for future personal projects. It is also an easy way to prototype remixing for live performance, and to pre-​ arrange parts for a live performance of a cover. The “scratch track” is a standard practice in multitrack recording. It is a live performance or demo recording, over which the individual musicians and vocalists will overdub their parts one at a time. Finally, the scratch track is either discarded or subtly mixed back in.5 This allows pristine isolation of tracks while still retaining the feel and energy of a “real” performance. Hip-​hop artists have their own version of the scratch track: they write and produce a song around a sample that is too expensive to clear, and then as a last step, replace or replay the sample. Will developed the method for a custom cover song when he observed students using scratch tracks to record covers in the studio. Sometimes they used their own live performances, but sometimes they used the original recording of the song they were trying to cover. Will nicknamed these “cheater” tracks because they are easier to build ideas around than a bare metronome click. His students would record their vocals over tempo-​mapped cheater tracks and then remove the cheaters, leaving perfectly synchronized vocals in place. They could then effortlessly sync, align, and quantize new drum and melodic parts. The steps in the custom cover song project are as follows: 1. Decide which song to cover. 2. Sync a recording of the song with the metronome. 3. Using the original as a cheater track, record new vocals or instrumental parts. 4. Remove the cheater track. 5. Create new backing elements, using original tracks, samples, or loops. Either stay faithful to the structure, harmony, and stylistic feel of the original, or alter it as you see fit. The resulting cover will sound inventive and handmade, even if it isn’t an “original” song. Furthermore, this cover can be easily adapted further into a new song by removing and replacing the remaining parts of the original.

5 Classic Motown recordings always left the scratch track in, which meant that the musicians had to recreate their performances precisely in overdubbing. That takes incredible skill!

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7.6.7. Syncing the Guide Track Using Ableton Live This project relies on Ableton Live for its warping and beat-​matching functionality. You can timestretch and manipulate tempo of audio clips in other DAWs, but the process may be more difficult or cumbersome. Here’s how to set Tempo Leader mode for beat matching: 1. Drag a recording of the original song into an audio track. 2. Double-​click the title bar of the audio to show clip details in the lower panel. 3. Under Warp, click the Follower button (Figure 7.15). It will change to read Leader. This makes the clip play back at exactly its original speed, and Live’s metronome will follow the tempo of the original track. 4. Activate the metronome in the upper left corner of the screen. 5. Listen to the track with the metronome all the way through. If the metronome does not start at the right place, you will need to manually identify the first downbeat of the song in the Detail panel’s waveform. When you have found find the transient mark corresponding to bar one, beat one, double-​click it to add a warp marker to it. Now right-​click the warp marker and select “Set 1.1.1. here”—​this will align the metronome with the song’s meter. 6. Continue listening to the song as the track plays with the metronome on. If the tempo drifts, find additional downbeats, double-​click them to add warp markers, and manually move these warp markers to the correct beats on the timeline. (In older recordings, the snare drum notes may be the loudest element of the track, in which case you should align them to beats two and four.) Do this until the entire track is in sync with the metronome. 7. Now the guide track is in sync and you can add new parts.

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Figure 7.15 Tempo Leader/​Follower switch, underneath the Warp button.

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7.6.7.1. Recording Vocals or Other Instrument Parts Do not feel bad if your students are unable to beat-​match a guide track on their own. It takes more ear training and musical experience than you might realize to be able to locate downbeats. This is easiest in electronic beat-​driven music, but the less prominent the drums are, the harder it will be. (We have come to appreciate Stevie Wonder for his steady timekeeping, and to resent the Beatles for their relative sloppiness.) Once the guide track is lined up, it functions as a great-​sounding metronome. Many students have trouble recording with a bare click track but can easily record along with a song they’re familiar with. After recording, the student vocals will perfectly line up with both the guide track and the metronome (Figure 7.16).

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7.6.7.2. Matching Other Instrumentals to the Vocals Students can try out ideas for new backing tracks for a song simply by dropping in entire instrumentals from other songs. This is a great way to prototype different approaches before committing to on a genre, and sometimes it results in a compelling remix right out of the box. 1. Once vocals have been recorded, mute the original guide track and try adding an instrumental to a song on a new audio track. 2. Don’t activate the Tempo Leader switch on any of the new clips—​only one clip can be the tempo leader. 3. Otherwise, repeat the procedure of finding downbeats, listening with the metronome, and getting the new clip in sync with the grid. 4. The new instrumental will probably be in a different key from the vocals. Use the Transpose control to shift the key up or down until you find one that sounds like it might work. Key matches are usually not perfect because chords almost never perfectly align, but sometimes songs will be close enough, and sometimes you get pleasant harmonic surprises. 5. Try this with several different instrumentals. You might even try using one instrumental for the verses and a different one for the choruses (Figure 7.17).

Figure 7.16 Original song with synchronized vocals recorded by a student. Vocals are aligned to the beat grid because the original song was aligned to the beat grid before recording took place.

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Figure 7.17 New vocals with several instrumental possibilities placed in sync underneath. Note that, in this example, none of the alternate backing tracks is meant to play at the same time; instead, each one is a distinct possible option.

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Students can use sampled backing tracks as starting points for a remixed version of a song, or simply as guides for their own playing. For example, a student can add a backing track from an existing song that fits the vocals well and then play the chords or riffs from that song on yet another track. Then they can remove the sampled backing tracks, leaving behind a song consisting entirely of their own recordings, guided by tracks that are no longer present. This method can be used to arrange parts for live performing as well. Students in a performing group can use the newly sampled guide tracks to generate ideas and to practice over. As rehearsal progresses, the guide tracks can slowly be removed. The result is a group of students doing an inspired, new-​sounding cover, entirely live but reusing licks and riffs from other existing songs. This type of performance hits the audience in an unexpected way: rather than the expected originals or faithful covers, instead they hear a hybrid, and they usually react with delight. The method is not guaranteed to work. It’s entirely possible to glue together a few songs in a way that technically works but that just does not feel right (see Chapter 9, Figure 9.20 for a student perspective on this challenge). Also, the new mix may have parts that are unplayable live, or that feel wrong together. As with any kind of arranging or music composition, it is easier to get things wrong than to get them right. The good news is that the custom cover method enables students to arrange their own parts for a group performance. This is widely considered to be too hard for youth ensembles to do on their own. There is an entire industry of adults offering arranging services for school music groups, at no small cost. If students have creative control over their repertoire, they will feel more satisfaction and less anxiety, all while saving money. Students will also be motivated by the knowledge that they are practicing the techniques of real-​world songwriters and producers.

7.6.8. Cultural Considerations When you or your students are choosing cover songs, you may run into the issue of white students’ wanting to do music associated with minority groups, particularly rap or R&B songs. Even with all the best intentions, white rap covers are usually ill-​advised. For example, when the mandolinist Chris Thile performed Kendrick Lamar’s Black Lives Matter

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anthem “Alright” on public radio in 2016, the reaction was broadly and strongly negative (Hein, 2020). We as a profession need to ask whether it’s acceptable for white musicians to perform songs that speak directly and exclusively to the personal experience of Black artists. This is an issue not just for music technology educators; it is one that every sector of our profession should be thinking about. But because electronic and popular music are so much a product of African-​American culture, the question is particularly acute for us. We are not arguing that white musicians and educators should “stay in their lane” and never explore Black music. There is a balance to be struck between appropriating Black culture and neglecting it, and we have a responsibility to seek out that balance. In the case of hip-​hop, the balance can best be found within the constraints of “keeping it real.” Hip-​hop is more than a music genre; it’s “a distinct worldview” (Petchauer, 2011, p. 1412). We should teach and create hip-​hop only with a respectful attitude toward its value system. In hip-​hop, keeping it real is a core value. This means that you should perform only music that speaks to your context and individual local experiences (Kruse, 2016, p. 54). A corollary of realness is the expectation that rappers should write their own material. The strength of the “no covers rule” in rap is so strong that it is rarely even spoken. It is more in keeping with hip-​hop values to have students write their own raps than to have them perform covers.

References Hein, E. (2020). Chris Thile, Kendrick Lamar, and the problem of the White rap cover. Visions of Research in Music Education, 35(1). Kruse, A. J. (2016). Being hip-​hop. General Music Today, 30(1), 53–​58. Petchauer, E. (2011). I feel what he was doin’: Responding to justice-​oriented teaching through hip-​hop aesthetics. Urban Education, 46(6), 1411–​1432.

7.7. Project Example: Movie Soundtrack 7.7.1. Project Duration Ten to thirteen sessions total. • Dialogue: Two to three sessions • Sound FX: Four to five sessions • Music: Four to five sessions

7.7.2. Technical Goals • Students will learn how to synchronize recorded dialogue and sound effects with video. • Students will learn about the Foley and sound design process. • Students will learn how to use Repeat button on Push to record rhythmic melodic patterns. • Students will learn how to bounce and reimport material to work around track limits and to simplify projects.

7.7.3. Creative Goals • Students will learn how to creatively implement similar sounds as substitutes for sounds in the scene.

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• Students will design postproduced sounds in a video production. • Students will choose scales and tempi that correlate to various emotions needed in the scene. • Students will learn how to create tension and drama with dissonant chords and note clusters.

7.7.4.  Examples

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Scenes from movies you choose.

7.7.5. Before Teaching This Lesson The goal of this project is to recreate the audio portion of a short video clip. We recommend that you curate your own collection of clips, making available to students 12 to 15 clips approximately one minute long that include a balance of dialogue, Foley/​sound effects, and music cues. This is more difficult than it sounds. An action scene from a Hollywood blockbuster contains far too many layers and elements for students to be able to recreate. You can learn to pace the project by completing it along with the students. Clips that Will has used include: • • • • •

The Matrix (1999): Dojo fighting scene The Princess Bride (1987): Chatty duelists scene (“I am not left handed!”) Ghostbusters (1984): Riding up in the elevator and zapping the housekeeping cart Ratatouille (2007): Remy decides to make the soup himself Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001): While learning how to fly a broom, Neville flies away out of control • Jurassic Park (1993): Scene with two raptors in the kitchen • Moonrise Kingdom (2012): Scout leader does the morning inspection • The Empire Strikes Back (1980): Lando opens the door and Vader is at the dinner table For a score-​only variant on this project, Ethan uses scenes from No Country For Old Men (2007), which has almost no music. You may want to avoid the very violent action scenes, but there are several excellent dialogue-​only scenes to choose from. You can also use silent films if you would prefer to have students work completely “from scratch.” Your taste in movies obviously will influence your list. We recommend including some classics along with newer movies for variety. If possible, use a DAW that can import video files and that enables sessions with many tracks. Ableton Live Intro cannot do either, but Live Standard can do both. If your DAW does not enable video, then you will need an additional video editing program like iMovie to combine the exported audio with the video. In this case, we recommend creating an audio-​only version of each video clip. This way, students will still be able to synchronize their audio cues to the original video clip, even if they are not able to do so with the picture directly. Film scores use an elaborate semiotic vocabulary of verbal–​visual associations, or, to put it more simply, clichés (Tagg & Clarida, 2003). Students have learned this vocabulary through a lifetime of movie and TV watching and video gaming. They invariably find it

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easier to describe musical tropes and gestures in cinematic terms than in musical ones. Our students often describe synthesizer music in terms of science fiction or video game scenes. For example, they hear fast-​tempo minor-​key music as “boss battles.” See Hein (2010) for a list of scales and their typical use in film scores.

7.7.6. Project Design There are three phases to this project: dialogue, Foley, and score. It is the longest project in this book, requiring at least ten sessions. It is also the most cross-​disciplinary of all the projects. To complete all the required phases of the movie soundtrack, students must demonstrate skills in audio editing, using MIDI instruments, and managing multiple external files. The result is usually a highly satisfying personalized movie clip that shows the student’s personality.

7.7.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 7.7.7.1. Session 1: Filmmaking Terms, Reviewing Clips Ideally, the first session begins with a quick overview of how sound for film works. Students are always interested to learn how much illusion is involved in creating even mundane movie and television scenes. For example, they are surprised to learn that most dialogue is replaced in postproduction (with ADR—​Automated Dialog Replacement), that most ambient sound is created artificially (with Foley), and that background crowd noise is often produced separately from the onscreen action (with “walla”). After introducing each of these terms, you can then give a brief overview of the project. Explain that the students will be replacing all of the audio in a one-​minute video clip. They will do this in three phases: 1. Overdubbing the dialogue with their own voices 2. Overdubbing all sound effects with Foley or designed sounds 3. Composing original music to go with the scene After describing the project, Will likes to show the original version of all of his available movie clips. He points out particularly obvious audio postproduction: artificially clear dialogue during a stunt, loud footsteps, eating noises, and so on. 7.7.7.2. Session 2: Importing Clips, Recording Dialogue The first step in the project is to re-​record all dialogue in the scene. If you are using Live, you will do the entire project in Arrangement View. Once students have imported their chosen clip, have them create a new audio track named for each character in the clip. They can then begin to re-​record each line of dialogue from the clip. Encourage them to do their best impression of the characters. There is no “emotion” setting in the DAW, so enthusiastic voice acting will make all the difference. During dialogue recording, don’t have clips snap to the grid—​in Live, have students right-​click anywhere in Arrangement View and set the grid to “Off.” After recording each line of dialogue, move the clips so that they line up exactly with the original version (Figure 7.18).

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Figure 7.18

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Recorded dialogue underneath the muted original video clip. Notice how the audio clips overlap slightly, which preserves continuity of “room tone” and allows precise alignment of the words with the original lines that are overdubbed.

7.7.7.3. Session 3: Finishing Dialogue, Pitching Voices Students can alter their voices to fit the nature of the characters. The rule of thumb for gender swapping: transposing a “male” voice up six semitones makes it sound approximately “female,” while transposing a “female” voice down six semitones makes it sound approximately “male.” Some characters may need special audio effects to sound believable (e.g., if they are talking on the phone or through a radio, or if they are robots or aliens). Once dialogue is recorded and matched to character needs, students can group their dialogue tracks and prepare to move on to sound effects. By this point, they will realize that they will simply be lining up relevant clips with each cue in the scene. You can direct them to their loop library or to a web resource like freesound.org to find useful sounds. 7.7.7.4. Sessions 4 to 6: Foley Overview, Finding Sound Effects It is helpful at this point to pause for a presentation about sound effects and Foley production. They are closely related, but not identical. Foley is the creation of “realistic” sounds performed in real time along with a scene. It is named after the Jack Foley, the first artist to make sound effects in real time with radio serials. Imagine a scene where two characters are eating dinner in a restaurant. There are sounds of pouring, plates clinking, chairs being moved, food being served, and eating that need to be reinforced. Foley artists break such a scene down into its sound elements, and then they perform each element live: scraping chairs, clinking forks, pouring water, and so on. Producing Foley sounds is very much like live musical performance. Sound designers, on the other hand, do not work in real time. Instead, they create sound effects through editing, sampling, and sound collection. It is instructive to show students behind-​the-​scenes footage of Ben Burtt, the legendary sound designer for the Star Wars saga, and for numerous other blockbusters of the 1980s and 1990s. A good mental model for the sound design portion of the project is to have students think of dioramas, the shoebox projects from elementary school. The largest and most obvious effects will be in the foreground: in a sword fight, they would be the sounds of clashing swords. The next most important sounds would be any movement ancillary to the main focus of the scene: footsteps, objects being knocked over or thrown just off

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screen, or anything else the characters interact with. (We discuss Foley sounds below.) The last sounds are the background elements that make up the scene’s setting. As students start looking for their first sound effects, here are a few tips for success: • If the sound effect happens several times (e.g., punching during a fight scene), find several variations of the sound. Repeating the same sound over and over comes across like a video game, not like a movie. • Realism is not always desirable. When movie characters draw swords, they make loud metallic sounds like knives being sharpened. The actual sound of a sword being drawn is dull. An action scene often requires heightened or exaggerated sounds. • If the object doesn’t exist or recordings aren’t available, consider how to substitute sounds for it. For example, you could make the sound of a falling boulder by recording a small rock being dropped and then lowering the recording’s pitch. 7.7.7.5. Session 7: Foley Finally, students should fill the entire scene with background sound. After the original video clip is fully muted and sound effects and dialogue have been added, there should be no “black holes” remaining where audio entirely stops (unless, of course, the scene depicts a space shuttle door opening and all the air getting sucked out into the vacuum of space). Going back to the diorama model, consider the final Foley touches as the box itself. Where are the characters? Outside or inside? Are there birds chirping? Is there air conditioning or wind blowing? Are there background characters chatting over dinner? If you have the luxury of working with smaller groups, it can be fun to set up a table of props and have students try to do live Foley recording with them. Don’t do the entire project this way—​it is time-​consuming and loud—​but it can be enlightening to figure out what mic placements are needed to create a good Foley track. 7.7.7.6. Session 8: Start a Separate Music Project One shortcoming of our method is that we have placed the sound effects without respect to song tempo. We have done this because so far we have not needed a song tempo—​all items have been arranged and aligned according to minutes and seconds, not bars and beats. For music recording, however, you will want to use the bars-​and-​beats grid and to control the tempo. It is easiest to create a separate session for writing and recording music. When that is finished, you can export the music and bring it into the main project file along with the dialogue and sound effects. Start the music project by creating a new project file and save it to the same location as the main dialogue and SFX project. Give students plenty of leeway when coming up with their own instrumentation for the score. At a minimum, they should begin with drums of some sort and strings. When the students are ready, demonstrate some common strategies for various types of music cues. 7.7.7.7. Sessions 9 to 11: Music Cues An action cue does not necessarily mean a car chase or a violent fight. Action can also be a conversation or a cooking scene. For our purposes, we define action as the main thing that happens in the scene.

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Figure 7.19 Action cue music on a string instrument track. The constant eighth notes play at the global tempo of 152 BPM. The top note moves around the scale notes, while the lower two notes remain in place.

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You can often score action with an ostinato pattern. A simple repetition at an appropriate tempo can set the pace and communicate the right emotions. For example, if characters are moving fast, fighting, or chasing each other, use a tempo faster than 120 BPM. Try writing repeated triads in eighth notes, where one note in each triad is changing (Figure 7.19). This gives a sense of movement that doesn’t sound too repetitive. An aggressive action cue might do this type of repetition on heavy drums, such as timpani, and use minor chords. If a character is doing something less aggressive but still moving quickly, the cue might use major scales and lighter percussion instruments like hi-​hat cymbal and tambourine. Now consider the example of a suspense cue. The traditional technique is to use cluster chords. Picture a character walking down a dark hallway slowly. She looks in the first door . . . nothing. A few more steps. The second door . . . nothing. She approaches the final door and nudges it open to discover . . . her little brother. Whew! You can mimic the visual tension in this scene using strings. Use sustained tremolo and hold one note out. As the tension builds, add another note that is a half-​step above or below the first. Then add another, and another, until the cluster of notes is very dissonant. Then, when the character opens the last door, release all the notes at once for instant relief of tension. The character breathes a sigh of relief, flips her hair, and turns around to see . . . the killer! Blast some low brass cluster chords. This technique also works to create that “ah-​hah” fast suspense sound, for when you need the music to surprise the audience: “Dun dun duuuuun!” This can be achieved with the cluster effect, but instead of placing tones right next to each other, space them in wide interval leaps up and down (Figure 7.20). Music under dialogue should be more subtle. Characters may be talking seriously about a complicated subject or discussing plot points that have already happened. Conveying emotions more complex than “happy” or “sad” requires more complex harmony. One easy way to achieve this is by stacking perfect fifths. These chords are great for dialogue situations because they sound mature, refined, and, most importantly, difficult to play. They are difficult to play on a piano instrument, but on a device like Ableton Push, it is easy to play complex chromatic chords because of the symmetrical note layout. You can also use Live’s Chord effect to automatically layer fifths on top of single input notes. In Figure 7.21, the chords are found underneath exposition dialogue. Students who don’t have music theory or keyboard training can use alternative MIDI controllers like

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Figure 7.20 A “fast suspense” cue. Here, during a surprising scene in the film, strings leap up and down over a few octaves as the cluster chord builds over a single measure.

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the Push or the aQWERTYon (discussed in Chapter 9) to discover rich and intriguing harmonic possibilities. 7.7.7.8. Sessions 12 to 13: Finishing Music and Nonmusic, Exporting, Combining with Movie, Exporting Again Students should flesh out and personalize their scores using instruments beyond drums and strings (Figure 7.22). They might try to rework material that was originally in the movie, or they can explore region-​specific instruments, ornamental elements of the orchestra, or electronic effects. You can provide inspiration by showing cues from movies—​sometimes borrowing ideas from the professionals yields great and original-​sounding results. The last step in the project is to merge the music with the dialogue and Foley (Figure 7.23). Simply export the music and import it onto a new audio track in the original dialogue/​Foley project. (Be sure to mute the audio from the original scene!) For the final touch, have the class spend some time mixing the music to fit underneath the dialogue. Music can be roughly as loud as sound effects, but it must be mixed low under dialogue for intelligibility. If your DAW can record automation, this step is easy. Simply disarm all audio tracks, hit Record, and adjust the volume of the music track in response to dialogue as it plays (Figure 7.24). A few minutes of work using this technique can yield a much more listenable project. Encourage students to do a final check for any missing lines or sound effects before turning the project in. When the project is looking and sounding great, students should export it as a video file. If your DAW does not import and export video, you can use a video editing program to match the soundtracks to the original video clips.

7.7.8.  Troubleshooting Since this project is very long, be sure to define a clear workflow so students don’t miss crucial steps. Some students will forget to mute their original movie clip after recording dialogue. Do a few spot checks as work transitions from dialogue to Foley.

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Figure 7.21

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(a)

An “under dialogue” chord played on an Ableton Push—​the bright pads are playing the chord. The chord shape can be moved around the pads in Chromatic scale layout to yield complex parallel harmonic movement. As long as the shape remains the same, the chords will sound as if fast transpositions are happening.

(b)

As with any project using the microphone, be prepared to troubleshoot mic and audio interface issues. As the mics get moved around, you will need to reset and tighten them more than usual. If mics and interfaces are unplugged and plugged back in, the DAW may not “see” them anymore unless you select them again in Preferences. Save yourself some trouble and teach students to troubleshoot this issue on their own. The two major pain points in this project are the transition between the dialogue/​ Foley step and the score step, and re-​combining the two separate session files at the end. Complex though it is, using two separate session files for dialogue/​Foley and music is still easier than doing both in one single session file. Be prepared for students to inevitably save their sessions in the wrong location with the wrong title, or to save over one session file with the other. You can avoid a great of pain by using an hourly backup system like Time Machine.

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Figure 7.22 Completed music score project. This project is entirely separate from the project containing dialogue and sound FX. The technical construction of this incidental music is similar to the Soundscape project in Chapter 9, but with more rhythmic elements, such as ostinati on drums and strings.

Figure 7.23 Folder containing the files for this project. Note the two .als project files and the exported music score mp3, which will be re-​integrated into the main project file as one long audio clip.

7.7.9. Differentiated Instruction The project is designed so that struggling students can achieve the broad strokes and still produce something enjoyable. This is why dialogue is at the beginning of the project and music is at the end. The movie clip selections should include a few options with less dialogue, so that students who need to catch up can use these “easier” clips and feel they are still with the rest of the class. Conversely, the music portion is where advanced students should be encouraged to be experimental and ambitious. While struggling students simply lay down an ostinato over the most obvious action segment, advanced students can dig into musical details and have the most control they have experienced up to this point over instrumentation, note choice, and postprocessing effects.

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Figure 7.24 Complete movie soundtrack project. The music score was exported from a secondary project and re-​imported into the master project. The volume level of the music is automated to fit under dialogue.

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Recording dialogue is embarrassing for some students. If everyone is recording at the same time, it reduces the embarrassment factor. This is a good incentive for keeping the class on pace together; students will want to be performing dialogue when everyone else is doing it, not when they are the only ones doing it. However, if students want to record their dialogue outside of class time, you should accommodate them if possible.

7.7.10. During Work Time This project is divided into three blocks of three to four sessions each, broken up by lectures or demonstrations on the subtopic. In the work days between the transitions, make sure students are completing their steps. This project is more self-​directed than usual, and you should keep the class from dragging or rushing excessively. If you can help the students build good work habits now, it will help during the entirely self-​directed final project. If you can, do your own version of this project alongside the class. You will need to model the various complicated steps anyway, and when students watch you have fun doing voice acting or creating suspenseful chords, it gives them a sense that you are collaborating creatively with them, not just telling them what to do. They will benefit from watching an adult work through the creative process, and you will benefit by honing your live demonstration skills.

7.7.11. Assessment Strategies 7.7.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Dialogue lines have been recorded properly and line up with the video, and they are audible over the sound effects and music. • Sound effects cover the entire scene, from obvious contact sounds to background environment sounds. • Music has ostinato layers and uses strings and drums.

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7.7.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Voices have emotional inflection and personality. • Details, either recorded or processed, help make the characters sound different from one another. • Sound effects draw your attention to details in the scene and reinforce the action. • Repeated sounds do not sound like they were copied and pasted. • Music conveys the emotional content of the scene and changes as needed with the video.

7.7.12. Making This Project Your Own If you do not want to embark on such a complex project, you can replace it with any activity that involves adding original audio to video. This project is about film sound, but it is also about project management. Any complicated project (e.g., a podcast, a live event, a documentary, etc.) will fulfill the latter purpose. As you select video clips, consider the aesthetic ideas you are expressing through them. Will favors clips from familiar blockbusters from the past few years or from the 80s and 90s, which tells students that he values these kinds of movies. Ethan uses clips from an artsy Coen brothers movie to build rapport with his hipster college students. Other teachers have adapted this project to focus on silent films, cartoons, or even scenes filmed by the students themselves. The key to this project is keeping it just complex enough to feel substantial, but just simple enough to be attainable by everyone. Not every student will be able to come up with a weighty musical statement about a clip of film, but all students should be able to record simple patterns during action and simple chords during dialogue.

References Hein, E. (2010). Scales and emotions. ethanhein.com/​wp/​2010/​scales-​and-​emotions Tagg, P., & Clarida, R. (2003). Ten little title tunes. Mass Media Music Scholars Press.

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Beginner audio-​based projects have the luxury of focusing on a clear goal, such as a 30-​ second radio ad or a loop-​based composition that arranges prerecorded clips. MIDI-​based projects, on the other hand, are more like starting from a blank page. Students must consider sound design and instrument choices, and they must be able to program notes and rhythms from scratch, rather than using prerecorded loops or recording audio.

8.1. Software Instruments Versus MIDI The MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) standard is a nearly universal protocol for connecting computers, synthesizers and other equipment together. When you introduce it to students, it is important to explain that MIDI data is not audio, but rather a form of computer-​readable music notation. The MIDI standard’s original purpose in the 1980s was to enable producers to control multiple synthesizers at once via keyboard controllers, sequencers, or computers. In hardware, it is easy to see the control flow from a controller to a sound-​generating module. In a DAW, it is more difficult to understand control flow because the sound-​generating modules are integrated into the software itself. The default GarageBand session includes a MIDI track preloaded with a sampled grand piano. When a piano-​style controller is played, the sound of a piano comes out, so it is easy to assume that the keyboard is “making” the sound. Students need to understand that the same keyboard can just as easily produce the sound of a xylophone, a synth pad, a sampled voice, a drum kit, and so on. Many of the projects in this section use techniques that reuse MIDI material on multiple tracks, each containing a different software instrument. This enables students to generate lots of material quickly. We have designed the projects to minimize the time students spend generating parts from scratch, both to help them overcome the terror of the blank page, and to give them a taste of real-​world production practice.1 A basic example of this exercise is the house music project (see Chapter 8.10). Students begin by writing simple basslines using only a few notes in a sequence. They then copy and 1 There is a surprising amount of overlap between producing electronic music in the DAW and orchestration. Just as you can have the same melody line played by the violins, the clarinets, the French horns, or all three, so too can you have the same MIDI clip play a synth lead, a pad, and a bass. This comparison may not mean much to your students, but it was very helpful for us. Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0008

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paste these parts onto several other tracks. They may shift the notes by octaves or double their tempo, but the performed contents of the clip remain unchanged from one track to another. On the surface, this appears to be a simple time-​saver, but it also introduces students to the ways that creating with MIDI differs from working with audio.

8.1.1. Drums Versus Not-​Drums, Step Time Versus Real Time As far as the electronic music world is concerned, there are two kind of instruments in the world: drums and not-​drums. This is an extremely simplified taxonomy of instruments, but it makes practical sense in electronic music contexts. Figures 8.1 and 8.2 show the drums versus not-​drums scheme at work in the Teenage Instruments OP-​1 and in Ableton Live, respectively. We focus the early projects on drum programming because it gives instant gratification: you press a pad or draw a MIDI event, and it triggers a drum sound. With a little guidance, students can produce legitimate-​sounding beats quickly. The early projects restrict pitched content to pre-​existing loops at first, so even complete novices will be able to create full-​fledged instrumental tracks that sound like “real” songs. This should build their confidence to the point where they will be ready to tackle the more complex and open-​ended projects. There are two ways to create music using MIDI: in real time or in step time. Real-​time MIDI recording is much like playing an instrument live, although it is easier to edit and change the performance afterward. Step time2 is more like composing with notation: you create a “score” that the computer then performs. The format of the score is a grid, either

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Figure 8.1 Teenage Engineering’s OP-​1 shows pitched and unpitched instruments with “Synth” and “Drum” icons.

Figure 8.2 Ableton Live browser. Pitched instruments are located under Sounds, while unpitched instruments are under Drums.

2 The term “step time” refers to the early days of sequencing, when drum machines and synths could only display one sixteenth note’s worth of the sequence at a time. The Roland TB-​303 synthesizer beloved of house music producers worked this way. Take it from us: this was not an easy or fun way to make music.

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on the screen or on a hardware sequencer like the Push. Each cell in the grid represents a sixteenth note. You can have drums play or not play simply by activating or deactivating cells in the grid. This method is low-​pressure and inviting compared to the demands of live performance. Creating melodies and chords with MIDI works in the same way: by drawing on the screen or lighting up pads on the grid. However, now there is the pitch axis to consider as well as the time axis. Fortunately, there are a variety of assistive methods for first-​ time composers and songwriters. You can limit the possible note choices to a particular scale, as with an Orff xylophone. You can also quantize live performances, meaning that each note is automatically moved to the closest beat in the metronomic grid. We limit students’ creative choices in the earlier projects to minimize option paralysis.

8.2. Functional Music Theory It is possible to teach MIDI using traditional compositional approaches. For example, our friend Barb Freedman (2013) has students use GarageBand to compose in sonata form. We prefer to take a less formal approach, starting by avoiding the word “composing.” For young people, the word evokes powdered wigs, quill pens, and curled-​up sheets of manuscript paper. We prefer the words “creating,” “writing,” “making,” “producing,” or “sequencing” music, because they have friendlier associations. We take a similarly informal and nontraditional approach to music theory. Western tonal theory has only limited applicability to groove-​based Afrodiasporic music, where harmony is minimal, circular, and modal or nonfunctional. (You can spend many nights in the club without ever hearing a V-​I cadence.) Music notation is also ill suited to the medium. If you do want to build a more robust music theory component into your songwriting and production projects, we recommend texts that center the stylistic norms of popular music, rather than the European classical tradition. Michael Hewitt’s Music Theory for Computer Musicians (2008) and Philip Tagg’s Everyday Tonality (2009) are both great resources. The most important theory concepts for pop music purposes are chord identities, rhythmic counting, scales, and common chord progressions (modal and tonal). The rules of common-​practice harmony and voice leading, formal counterpoint, and Schenkerian reductions are not particularly relevant, and students find them off-​putting. Above all, it is critical to use descriptive, rather than prescriptive, language. You should present theory concepts as guidelines and recommendations, rather than as the “right” or “wrong” way of doing things. Any time you present something as being wrong, a student will think of a song they love that does that exact thing. Instead, we prefer terms like “stylistically appropriate/​inappropriate” or “conventional/​unconventional.” For example, beginner drum programmers should follow the rule that snare drums go on the backbeat, because that will ensure that their beats sound “right.” However, more advanced programmers should feel free to try placing their snares elsewhere. If you simply say that snare drums always have to go on the backbeat, end of discussion, then anyone who has heard Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)” (2008) will be able to contradict you. There are various shortcuts and assistive devices for helping novice musicians explore scales; we cover those in depth in Chapter 9.1.

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References Freedman, B. (2013). Teaching music through composition: A curriculum using technology. Oxford University Press. Hewitt, M. (2008). Music theory for computer musicians. Course Technology PTR. Tagg, P. (2009). Everyday tonality. Mass Media Music Scholars Press.

8.3. Elements of Music Many of us learned that the seven elements of music are pitch, duration, dynamics, tempo, timbre, texture, and form. These elements are all present in electronic and pop music. However, they are not the terms in which electronic musicians typically think. Many musicians think instead in terms of live instrumentation. Picture a four-​piece rock band playing on a stage: a drummer, a bassist, a guitarist, and a singer. These four band members each represent an element of rock: the beat, the bassline, the chords, and the top-​line melody. Most electronic tracks will also use these same elements, even if they produce them using very different tools. A chord part will have long blocks of harmony and will sit in the background of the mix. A bass part will have single low-​ pitched notes that harmonically support the chords while rhythmically aligning with the beat. A melody part will be in a higher frequency range and will be a single-​note line that a person could sing (even if it is not actually a vocal part). Ableton’s Making Music site begins with a simple sequencer that lets you combine drums, bass, chords, and melodies (Figure 8.3).

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Figure 8.3 Ableton’s Learning Music website. It presents electronic music as consisting of four basic components: drums, bass, chords, and melodies. From these four elements, users can dive deeper into the other formal elements of music.

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8.4. Sound Design One element of music that is often not discussed as a creative component in traditional music theory is timbre. In classical composition, timbre is largely a given. The sound of the cello is consistent from one instrument and performer to another. You can play it with various techniques to make notes louder or softer, and of varying length or intensity, and you can place it in different acoustic spaces. But these variables will only alter the sound to a limited extent; no matter what, the cello will sound like a cello. In electronic music, on the other hand, you have complete control over the timbre of each sound, and you can radically alter timbres through simple knob-​twiddling. A central focus of professional electronic music production is sound design, the creation of new instrument sounds. A producer might start with a sampled cello and pitch-​shift it, stretch it, reverse it, filter it, add a long delay, and otherwise transform it into something unrecognizably new. It is not enough to think about notes and durations; students should also be thinking about sound itself as a crucial expressive dimension. A classical composer can think of notes as abstractions, leaving it to conductors and performers to determine exactly how they will sound. Producers, however, are responsible for the realization of their ideas as recordings as well, so they must also think about audio engineering. The technical and creative aspects are inseparable (see Figure 8.4).

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Figure 8.4 Diagram (adapted from Jackson, 2013) showing sound design, audio engineering, and digital tools as related but distinct disciplines of musicianship.

Music

Sound Design Musicology Music theory Composing

Arranging Instrumentation Musicianship Ear training

Synthesis Sampling Signal processing Audio effects Sound theory Ear training

Recording

DAWs Audio equipment Instruments Plug-ins Controllers Computer/OS

Tools/DAW

Mixing Mastering Audio theory Pro audio Ear training Audio electronics

Audio Engineering

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8.5. Genre Deconstruction It may seem daunting to integrate music theory, sound design, and the technical aspects of MIDI into the same project. This is why it’s a good idea to narrow the scope. Rather than teaching sound design generally, teach the sound design techniques that are specific to a genre. For example, in the trap project (Chapter 8.11), the 808 sub bass might be inaudible on headphones unless you add distortion. This is a natural opportunity to explain frequencies and overtones. By the same token, rather than teaching all of the scales at once, introduce them as they arise in specific projects. For example, present the natural minor scale and Phrygian mode as the idiomatic sounds of trap, and contrast them to the major scale, which will sound wrong in that context. You can also broaden the scope of genre-​based projects as needed. The future bass project uses premade instruments, but you can have students create their own instruments using technical synthesis methods instead. Genres also present great opportunities to talk about musical form. When students sequence MIDI from scratch, they must immediately think about combining notes into phrases, combining phrases into sections, and combining sections into songs. Arrangement and texture enter into these considerations as well, since students can distinguish their sections by reusing the same MIDI material on different instrument tracks with different intensity levels, as in the trap project, or by creating contrasting parts for each section, as in the future bass and slow jam projects. Finally, while lyric writing is beyond the scope of this book, you can easily extend the melody-​writing aspects of the projects to include writing lyrics as well.

8.6. Project Example: Drum Programming 8.6.1. Project Duration Three to five sessions.

8.6.2. Technical Goals • Students will program beats on the Groove Pizza. • Students will learn how to play and program drum beats on Push.

8.6.3. Creative Goals • Students will learn the basic rules of making drum patterns and feeling groove. • Students will experience the differences and similarities between different types of drum instruments and will learn to pick them out of the sound mass. • Students will learn standard patterns and rhythmic motifs characteristic of various genres, including rock, funk, hip-​hop, electronic dance music, and Afro-​L atin styles. • Students will gain an understanding of syncopation, the difference between strong and weak beats, and the concept of swing.

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8.6.4. Listening Examples • James Brown, “The Funky Drummer Parts One and Two” (1970) • Skull Snaps, “It’s a New Day” (1973) • Herbie Hancock, “Chameleon” (1973) • Michael Jackson, “Billie Jean” (1982) • RUN-​D.M.C., “Sucker M.C.’s” (1984) • OutKast, “So Fresh, So Clean” (2001)

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8.6.5. Before Teaching This Lesson Drum programming is a valuable skill in any musician’s toolkit, even if they have no ambitions in electronic music production. It improves timekeeping, makes previously abstract rhythmic concepts concrete, and makes the musician more conscious of the role that drums play in many styles of music. Also, on a practical level, practicing over a beat is more fun and musical-​feeling than using a metronome.

8.6.6. Project Design The method we use to create drum patterns is fairly foolproof. It relies on the snare drum being constant, and other parts being more variable. If the snare drum plays a solid backbeat, you can experiment more freely with the kick and cymbal parts. If you start with a “skeleton groove” of a kick on the downbeat and a snare drum on beats two and four, you can’t go wrong.

8.6.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 8.6.7.1. Session 1: The Groove Pizza The Groove Pizza (musedlab.org/​groovepizza) is a web application that lets you program drum patterns on a circular grid. It was developed by Ethan and his colleagues at New York University’s Music Experience Design Lab (Hein & Srinivasan, 2019). The circle represents one measure of musical time, and slices represent beats—​by default, 4/​4 time subdivided into sixteenth notes. (You could also choose to think of the slices as two measures of eighth notes, or half a measure of thirty-​second notes.) The downbeat is at twelve o’clock on the circle. Each ring controls a different drum sound: bass drum on the outer ring, snare on the middle ring, and hi-​hat on the inner ring. The Slices setting changes the number of sixteenth notes in the measure, thereby determining the time signature. The Groove Pizza is different from other circular drum-​programming interfaces in the way that it represents rhythms geometrically (Figure 8.5). The app connects the activated cells in each ring to make shapes. For example, if you place a kick drum on each quarter note (the ubiquitous four-​on-​the-​floor rhythm), it appears as a square tilted on its corner. The popular tresillo rhythm (three sixteenth notes, three sixteenth notes, two sixteenth notes) appears as an approximate hexagon. Notice that below the circular grid, there is a more conventional linear grid. When you activate and deactivate cells in one view, the corresponding cells automatically update in the other. At the bottom of the screen is a row of four miniature “pizzas.” These can be used to program patterns that are more than one measure long.

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Figure 8.5 The Groove Pizza showing a four-​on-​the-​ floor kick drum pattern and a tresillo snare drum pattern.

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On the left side of the screen, the Specials menu lists some preset patterns. The Shapes menu gives a set of geometric shapes that users can drag onto any of the rings: a triangle, square, pentagon, hexagon, and octagon, plus a blank circle that removes all beats from a ring. If the shape does not fit evenly into the number of cells in the ring (as with the hexagon on a sixteen-​slice pizza), the app places the vertices into the nearest available cells. Placing shapes in this way creates maximally even rhythms that are nearly always musically satisfying (Toussaint, 2011). For example, if you place a pentagon on a sixteen-​slice pizza, you get rumba or bossa nova clave. You can use the Share menu to export your groove as an audio or MIDI file, or to open your pattern directly in Soundtrap or Noteflight. Why program your beats on a circle? Linear representations like standard notation and the grid representation used by drum machines are not the easiest way to understand how rhythm works. Melodies consist mostly of relationships between adjacent or closely spaced events, but rhythm consists of relationships between nonadjacent events. The left-​to-​right representation doesn’t tell you why you should put your snare drums on the backbeats, for example, and it doesn’t give you any indication that the first and third beats in the measure are more functionally related than the first and second beats are (Figure 8.6). On the circle, however, pairs of metrically related beats are directly opposite each other. Furthermore, patterns that are attractive to the eye are also attractive to the ear, and vice versa. Take a look at son clave, one of the most widely used rhythms in the world (Toussaint, 2011). When written from left to right, it looks like an arbitrary distribution of beats. On the circle, however, you can see a neat symmetry between the fourth and twelfth steps of the pattern (Figure 8.7).

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Figure 8.6 Drum programming grid in FL Studio.

Figure 8.7

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The symmetry of son clave.

Syncopation is to rhythm what dissonance is to harmony (Temperley, 2008). It’s easier to see syncopation on the circle, because the strongest beats are the cardinal directions (north, south, east, and west) while the weaker beats are in between (south-​southwest, east-​northeast, and so on). Students can get an intuitive sense of how syncopation works by comparing the Groove Pizza’s “Billie Jean” (Figure 8.8) and “Chameleon” (Figure 8.9) presets. Even without hearing these grooves, you can tell that they’re related but different. “Billie Jean” has an obvious symmetry. Accented backbeats are syncopations, but we’re so used to them that they function more like alternative strong beats (Biamonte, 2014). “Chameleon” looks like someone took “Billie Jean” and shook it. One of the snares got knocked a sixteenth note earlier, one of the kicks got bumped an eighth note later, and one of the hi-​hats fell off completely. “Planet Funk” is Ethan’s nickname for his preferred beatmaking template because it looks like Saturn viewed edge-​on (Figure 8.10). The hi-​hats are the planet itself, the snares are the “rings,” and the lone kick drum at the top is a “moon” (Hein, 2017).

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Figure 8.8 Drum pattern from “Billie Jean” by Michael Jackson (1982).

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Figure 8.9 Drum pattern from “Chameleon” by Herbie Hancock (1973).

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Figure 8.10 Planet Funk—​ eighth notes.

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“It’s a New Day” by Skull Snaps (1973) is one of the most sampled breakbeats in hip-​hop history (Read, 2016). It’s the Planet Funk template with some extra moons (kick drums). In “It’s a New Day,” the kick on the downbeat (the topmost slice) has a kick anticipating it one sixteenth note earlier, and another following it an eighth note later (Figure 8.11). The snare drum hit at nine o’clock is anticipated by two more kicks. All of that activity is balanced by the bottom right quarter of the pizza, in which the kick is absent. It’s close to being symmetrical, with just enough variation to keep it interesting. Placing a hi-​hat on every slice of the pizza creates makes a busier version of Planet Funk (Figure 8.12). You can make good hi-​hat patterns by filling all the sixteenth notes and then working subtractively, carving away pieces of the “sound block” (Ruthmann, 2012, p. 178). Deleting the “wrong” notes by process of elimination can be easier than identifying the “right” ones on a blank pattern. This exercise also communicates the idea that silences are not simply the absence of sound, but are crucial rhythmic elements in their own right. If students have not yet discovered the Swing parameter yet, encourage them to try it. Swing is one of the most important rhythmic concepts in Western vernacular music, but few people outside of jazz learn it in any formal way. There’s no standard way to notate swing, and DAWs usually only represent it as a numerical value. The Groove Pizza shows swing by alternately expanding and contracting the width of each slice. At 0% swing, the wedges are all of uniform width (straight time). At 50% swing, the odd-​numbered slice in each pair is twice as long as the following even-​numbered slice. This extreme form of swing is also known as “12/​8 shuffle.”

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Figure 8.11 Drum pattern from “It’s A New Day” by Skull Snaps (1973).

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Figure 8.12 Planet Funk—​ sixteenth notes.

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In jazz and related styles swing occurs at the eighth-​note level. However, starting in about 1960, it became more common to swing at the sixteenth-​note level instead. To hear the difference, compare two Jackson 5 recordings: “Rockin’ Robin” (1972) has an eighth-​ note swing feel that evokes the jazz era, while “I Want You Back” (1969) has a sixteenth-​ note swing feel that feels more contemporary. Hip-​hop and dance music always swing at the sixteenth-​note level. 8.6.7.2. Session 2: Make Beats

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Once students have a sense of what makes a good drum pattern, you can set them loose to make their beats. If you are using Ableton Push controllers, begin by explaining the pad layout they will be using for programming patterns. The highlighted yellow pads are the playable drum hits. The top half of the pad area is the drum pattern, and the bottom right area sets the pattern length. Leave the length area alone for now. First, demonstrate how playing a pad causes it to highlight, and that the last pad played keeps its highlight until another pad is pushed. The top pad area shows the pattern sequence for the highlighted pad—​right now, all of them are blank. Have students start playback and press random pads in the top half of the grid to watch the green box scroll by and hear their pattern change. A few will attempt to make actual drum grooves, but many will simply want to make cool patterns light up. Let this happen for a few minutes, and then have everyone press the New button together to get a fresh start on making beats with an actual groove. The next step is to place snares on the backbeats. The fifth column in the pattern sequencer is the same as the east and west points on the Groove Pizza. Fill the entire column with snares (or claps, or rimshots). Will likes to pause for a moment to illustrate the power of having a snare drum on the backbeat. He loads up several of the percussion pads (shakers, toms, etc.) with random patterns and presses play. The result sounds like avant-​garde experimental music. Then he lights up column five with snares, and the groove immediately snaps into place. There should be a kick on the downbeat (the top left) pad. Beyond that, students have some choices to make, since different genres use kick drums differently. Placing kicks on columns one and three creates a standard rock pattern. Putting them on columns one and five creates a four-​on-​the-​floor dance pattern. Placing them on every third pad creates a Latin feel. Avoid using too many kicks—​a maximum of twelve is a good rule of thumb, unless the student wants to create Swedish black metal. A good demonstration is to put a 3–​3–​2 pattern on each row and then remove some of the kicks to customize. You can place hi-​hats and other cymbals wherever you would like, within reason. Be advised that it is easy to make them too loud using the pattern generator, which plays back notes at a high velocity (100 out of 128 by default). You should consider turning the cymbals down after placing them using the volume/​velocity setting. Students should now generate a few clips. Remind students to start by placing snares on column five. Also encourage them to experiment with the tempo setting. It’s easy to switch modes unintentionally with the Push by pressing the wrong button, so get familiar with the troubleshooting section before starting this.

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8.6.7.3. Session 3: Finishing Touches Show students how to refine their patterns by holding down pads in the pattern grid, which will reveal additional settings for per-​note velocity, as well as controls for nudging the note slightly off the grid lines. This is useful for emphasizing some notes over others, and for creating “drunken drummer” effects, as in J Dilla beats. You should also demonstrate Note Repeat mode, which triggers sounds repeatedly when you hold a pad down. This mode is especially useful for creating fast hi-​hat patterns in trap beats. Finally, show students how to record beats via live “finger drumming” on the yellow pads. Few students will be able to play along with the metronome effectively, even if Record Quantization is activated, but it is worth a try. Manually place snares on column five first as a rhythmic anchor, and then play the kicks and hi-​hats live.

8.6.8.  Troubleshooting When choosing Drum Rack instruments on Push, students will confuse the two thin green buttons used to select and load instruments. You can easily spot students who pressed the button on the left, which loads a blank Drum Rack, by the darker shade of yellow on their drum pad area. You can explain that Live allows you to load an empty Drum Rack because some producers prefer creating drum kits from scratch. The main thing is to emphasize that it is easy to choose the right one (it’s on the right!) so no one will feel anxiety about hidden complexity. While working in Drum Rack mode, students often press the pads that control clip length on the bottom right accidentally. If this happens, they will be confused when the second half of the longer clip is playing, saying, “My clip stopped playing,” or “My green box goes away after a while and then comes back,” or “My green box only scrolls through the first two lines.” If any pads in the lower right are lit up other than the first two, deactivate them. It is not necessary to explain clip length in any depth at this point; it is enough to just tell everyone to only have those two pads activated. Sometimes a student will click the mouse in a screen location that causes their clip to stop playback. The clip will still be visible, and the student can add notes, but the clip will not play. The easy fix is to use the up/​down arrows to reselect and retrigger the clip, so the green box resumes its scrolling. It’s fairly common for some students to miss a step and follow instructions for the wrong pad. For example, they will place kick drums on the backbeats instead of snares. Periodically check in with them and ask whether they think the beat sounds right. Sometimes when students are changing the Push to Note mode, they will press the Note button twice, activating 64-​pad mode and turning the entire pad area yellow. They can return to the normal drum pad view by pressing the Note button one more time.

8.6.9. Differentiated Instruction Most students will be approaching this project as beginners, unless they are expert drummers or have programmed drums before. They will be sufficiently challenged by experimenting with the Groove Pizza, learning the mechanics of the Push, and getting their beats to sound good, and they will not need any additional problems to solve. If

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some students do master drum programming quickly, you can invite them to try creating longer patterns, layering multiple drum hits together, and accenting certain notes. Some students will have trouble making anything that sounds good, because they are not used to distinguishing between different types of drums. They will need you to lay down a definitive series of rules. Help them to learn the sequence of pressing New, hitting the snare drum pad, lighting up all of column five, and then pressing the kick pad. If they are able to create a musical-​sounding kick and snare groove, they should start feeling confident enough to try adding cymbals and other sounds.

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8.6.10. During Work Time As always, it’s crucial to walk around the room and anticipate the problems described in the “Troubleshooting” section. Students will feel more comfortable experimenting and composing beats if they feel like you know everything that can go wrong before it does. The more quickly you spot and solve issues, the more confident students will be. It’s good to get them into the habit of asking for help and feedback proactively, rather than waiting until the project is done.

8.6.11. Assessment Strategies 8.6.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Snare drum plays on beats two and four. • Kick drum does not play too many notes. 8.6.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Cymbal parts are not too loud or distracting—​kick and snare should be the focus. • Kick drum is in some kind of groove pattern and not just playing randomly. • Drum parts are not excessively busy or cluttered.

References Biamonte, N. (2014). Formal functions of metric dissonance in rock music. Music Theory Online, 20(2). Hein, E. (2017). Seeing classic beats with the Groove Pizza. ethanhein.com/​wp/​2016/​ seeing-​classic-​beats-​with-​the-​groove-​pizza/​ Hein, E., & Srinivasan, S. (2019). The Groove Pizza: A study in music and HCI. In S. Holland, T. Mudd, K. Wilkie-​McKenna, A. McPherson, & M. M. Wanderley (Eds.), New directions in music and human-​computer interaction (pp. 71–​94). Springer. Read, C. (2016). Top 20 most sampled breakbeats: 2016 update. whosampled.com/​news/​2016/​ 12/​06/​top-​20-​most-​sampled-​breakbeats-​2016-​update/​ Ruthmann, A. (2012). Engaging adolescents with music and technology. In S. Burton (Ed.), Engaging musical practices: A sourcebook for middle school general music (pp. 176–​191). Rowman & Littlefield Education. Temperley, D. (2008). Syncopation in rock: A perceptual perspective. Popular Music, 18(1), 19. Toussaint, G. T. (2011). The rhythm that conquered the world: What makes a “good” rhythm good? Percussive Notes, (November), 52–​59.

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8.7. Project Example: Beatmaking 8.7.1. Project Duration One to two sessions.

8.7.2. Technical Goals • Students will use Session Mode on Push to trigger clips and adjust track volumes. • Students will experience the workflow of beginning in Session View and ending in Arrangement View.

8.7.3. Creative Goals • Students will dynamically compose the form of their song by triggering their patterns in Session View.

8.7.4. Listening Examples • Parliament, “Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof off the Sucker)” (1976) • James Brown, “Give It Up Or Turnit A-​Loose” [Remix] (1986) • DJ Shadow, Endtroducing . . . (1996) • Daft Punk, Discovery (2001) • J Dilla, Donuts (2006) We suggest that you focus on examples that are grooves rather than songs per se. It will be easy to find current examples that resonate with your student culture. Instrumental versions of current rap and dance songs are always a good resource.

8.7.5. Before Teaching This Lesson Luis-​Manuel Garcia (2005) defines a “loop” as a riff of modular length that you strongly expect to repeat. Every form of American popular music is organized like a pyramid of loops. At the base of the pyramid is the groove, which runs nonstop, even if only implicitly. Above that are two-​bar loops (drums and bass), four-​bar loops (guitars and keyboards), eight-​bar loops (vocal melodies), sixteen-​bar loops (verses and choruses), and so on. Groove-​based genres like house, techno, funk, and hip-​hop create structure by layering, adding, and subtracting loops, allowing for the seemingly paradoxical effect of an ever-​changing same. In other words, these styles define song sections with changes of texture, not changes in harmony or melody. Why do people around the world enjoy loop-​based music so much? One theory is that the extended repetition of precisely identical elements supports the listener’s ability to perceptually separate textural layers. There’s a difference between song-​level listening, where you attend to surface-​level events and larger structures, and groove-​level listening, where you attend to background-​level events and smaller structures. The song structure in a P-​Funk or James Brown song may be so minimal as to barely even seem like a song at all. This is intentional; your attention should be on the groove itself, so you can “sink into the subtleties of the changing same” (Danielsen, 2006, p. 186). You can shift your focus

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between layers of the groove, experiencing one grouping as being the “main idea” at one moment, and a different grouping as being the “main idea” the next moment. The music does not predetermine the path of your focus (Garcia, 2005, para. 5.2). People love the experience of directing their own attentional flow. By manipulating loops in the DAW, completely inexperienced musicians can easily experiment with groove structures. Live’s Session View and Push are ideal for this purpose, since clips can be performed in a playful, improvisational way, rather than using the slower and less gratifying method of arranging them on the screen. Will has found through testing his lessons that you can do two or three basic lessons using the Push alone (aside from exporting at the end). Live presumes that the user knows how timelines are supposed to behave, and Session View is a container for various potential alternate timelines. However, before you can finish and export your song, you need to commit to a single sequence of events. To demonstrate Push usage, Will suggests that you use a document camera to display your own Push on the class projector. It is easier to point buttons out visually than to explain them verbally, especially when students are confronted with 64 unlabeled pads whose function depends on what mode the controller is set to. We also suggest manually changing the default settings for each Push unit as follows. After pressing the Setup button: • Set Workflow to Clip. • Set Fixed Length to On. While holding the Quantize button: • Set Rec Quantize to On.

8.7.6. Project Design This project involves arranging the drumbeats that students created in the drum programming project (see Chapter 8.6) along with loops that come with your DAW to put together an instrumental groove track. The result will be a project that is 50% prerecorded melodic clips and 50% original drum patterns. Within that constraint, the project is quite customizable. You can focus it on a specific genre or leave it stylistically open-​ended. If the students do not have any drum patterns created yet, follow the quick and dirty guide to making beats in this chapter. If you are using Live, allow time for students to experiment with Session View and its various buttons and behaviors. Keep the stakes low for this first exposure and don’t require to students to save their work if they don’t want to. Students who have used other DAWs will prefer to use Arrangement View for everything, which we can understand, since we felt the same way when we started using Live. However, you should push3 students out of their comfort zones, because the potential rewards are great. Once they experience real-​time clip launching, students will quickly begin to enjoy it. Will describes the feeling as “DJing your own personal party.” Ethan’s children started jamming with the Push when they were toddlers, and now it is second nature for them.

3 No pun intended.

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8.7.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 8.7.7.1. Sessions 1 to 2: Basic Drumming in a DAW If you are starting from scratch and do not have any drum programs created (such as the Groove Pizza material found in Chapter 8.6), you can sequence drum patterns manually via MIDI. For this lesson, begin by introducing the basic functionality of your drum programming device or method of choice to students. If you are working in the piano roll on screen, have students create an empty one-​measure loop and draw in events so they can hear the corresponding drum sounds play as the playhead crosses them. If students are using a MIDI controller like Push, show them how to put it in drum sequencing mode. The idea here is the same as the piano roll: show how when you light up a particular pad, its assigned drum sound plays when the playhead indicator crosses that pad. This functionality is common to all drum machines, and it is sometimes referred to as sequencing or “step-​time” programming. After a few minutes of exploration and random beatmaking, it is time for the students to start creating intentionally designed drum patterns. Whatever method you use, the first order of business is to learn what role each drum sound plays in the beat. We introduce these in order from most to least strictly formulaic.

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8.7.7.2. Snare Drum/​Clap The snare or clap plays the backbeats (beats two and four) in every form of American vernacular and pop music since at least the 1950s (Tamlyn, 1998).4 We recommend that you always begin your drum patterns with snares or claps on the backbeats, and that you treat this as an inflexible rule. Experienced drummers will know that, in reality, you can be a bit more flexible than this with the backbeats, but it’s good to be dogmatic about it with the beginners. Will has a magical demonstration of the backbeat’s power to organize a groove. He creates a random drum pattern by scattering sixteenth notes across the different drum sounds. He lets the class listen to it and hear how unmusical it sounds. Next, he places a hard clap on beats two and four (Figure 8.13). Suddenly, thanks to a lifetime of listening to pop music, the students hear the random drum hits as clever syncopations. They can easily imagine this pattern as a dance track intro and can anticipate where the kick would Figure 8.13 Snare drum on beats two and four, the backbeats. For a halftime feel at higher tempos, place snares on beat three instead.

4 Also, be sure students understand that they are supposed to clap on the backbeats. Friends don’t let friends clap on one and three.

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Figure 8.14 Four-​on-​the-​floor kick drum template.

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Figure 8.15 Tresillo 3 + 3 + 2 kick drum template.

come in when the beat drops. Will takes the backbeats away, and the students are back floating in outer space with no metrical reference. Not only is this a good classroom demo, it is also a cleverly misleading drum intro. 8.7.7.3. Kick Drum The rules of kick drum placement are less strict than the rules for snares and claps. There are two template patterns we like to present. The first is to place kick drums on every quarter note. This is the four-​on-​the-​floor pattern common to dance musics from the swing era through disco and on to the present (Figure 8.14). You can embellish this basic pattern by adding a few more kicks on any sixteenth note. If you remove the kicks from beats two and four, the pattern takes on more of a rock, funk, or hip-​ hop feel. The second template is based on a common Latin rhythm called tresillo, a 3 + 3 + 2 pattern of sixteenth notes (Figure 8.15). Tresillo is a “busier” feel and usually sounds better at slower tempo, which creates a trap, dancehall, or reggaetón feel. To customize the tresillo template, try removing kicks rather than adding them. 8.7.7.4. Hi-​hat Cymbal The hi-​hat is the most flexible of the three core drum set elements. It can keep time in a steady pattern (Figure 8.16), it can decorate the kick and snare groove, or it can do a mixture of both. If the underlying groove is solid, you can place hi-​hats on randomly chosen sixteenth notes and they will sound at least okay. If the kick is playing four on the floor, a tresillo pattern will sound great on the hi-​hats. If your MIDI controller has a Note Repeat or arpeggiator function, now is a good time to introduce it, since you can use it to fill in repeated hi-​hat patterns quickly. This

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Figure 8.16 Hi-​hat cymbal playing the same pattern on each beat. The hi-​hat can be highly variable, to the point of randomness. It is important to try to make it sound softer than the kick and snare.

Figure 8.17 Prerecorded clips alongside MIDI drum clips.

is also a good time to adjust volume levels. The hi-​hat should not overpower the kick and snare. For the rest of this session, students should create several of their own drumbeats. 8.7.7.5. Session 2: Adding Loops There are two ways to approach the rest of the project: by arranging loops on the timeline, or by launching them in real time using Live Session View or something similar. If you are using the former technique, you can follow the same procedure as in the arranging clips project in Chapter 7.2 or the third and fourth sessions of the simple remix project in Chapter 7.4. Here we describe the process for using Live and Push. Open Live and show students how to change to Session View on screen using the mode switching buttons (or the Tab key). Load some clips from a diverse sample library like the Loopmasters Pack. Start by having students load several clips onto one track and demo the behavior of clips and scenes. The rule of the game is that only one clip per column can play at a time, and when you trigger clips, they won’t start until beat one of the next measure.5 Use drum clips only at first. When students are ready, they should add a second track for non-​drum clips (Figure 8.17). 5 You can change this behavior by changing clip quantization settings, but that is for another time.

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Spend several minutes allowing students to trigger clips and mix between different combinations of clips and scenes. Demonstrate firing scenes with the green master triggers, and show how to stop a track by triggering an empty clip slot. 8.7.7.6. Session 3: Recording

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Now that students can load and trigger clips, it is time to load up their drum patterns and some melodic loops and see if they can build a finished groove. Students should narrow their clip choices down to three combinations that work well together. Remove everything else by holding the Delete key while selecting the clip on Push. If you are using Live Intro, do not use the Duplicate feature to save good combinations, because you will quickly run out of scenes. Instead, use the Clip workflow, and move clips around on the screen to organize pleasing combinations into scenes (the same row). Review how to trigger whole rows of clips by launching scenes. Next, it is time to record the best three or four ideas into Arrangement View. Encourage students to watch the playback indicator and to change scenes every eight bars. Even if they don’t understand musical counting yet, they can do this by watching the timer on the top of the screen and trigger scenes on every multiple of eight. It’s important to know that you cannot use the Record button on Push to do this; you have to use the one on the computer screen. Remind students to adjust the volume between scenes by pressing Volume, and encourage them to take control of their mix and pay attention to the quality of the sound blend. After recording, switch back to Arrangement View. Click the Back to Arrangement button (the orange arrow in the top right) to unlock this view. Students can take a few minutes to edit their arrangement and fix any mistakes by adding or removing clips. Once they are happy with their results, have them double-​click Stop, then export and turn in their tracks.

8.7.8.  Troubleshooting After recording to Arrangement View, you’ll need to train students to press the orange Back to Arrangement button to unlock the view. Will explains this as Live’s way of saying, “Are you sure you’re done making patterns? Are you ready to live in this view for the rest of your time?” We know that you can actually switch back and forth but it’s good to get in the habit of mentally separating Session View and Arrangement View, since you must always finish your track in Arrangement. Automation recording is not saved with the project, and every now and then a student will turn it off accidentally, possibly affecting the next group of students. If anyone complains of volume changes not recording, check that the Automation light on Push is lit bright red. It is rare but possible for a student to accidentally change their Launch Quantization in Session View. The “1 Bar” menu on the top left near the metronome dictates that clips will only launch at the beginning of each measure. If a student changes this setting unintentionally, they may be confused why their clips aren’t following the same rules as your demo.

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8.7.9. Differentiated Instruction Most students will be focusing on the mechanics of clip launching and moving things around on the timeline. Unless they have prior experience making loop-​based electronic music production, everyone will be on an even playing field. Students struggling with their drumbeats should focus on placing the snare drum on beats two and four. The project is designed so that if backbeats are the only new takeaway for the student, the project should still sound somewhat musical. When necessary, simplify the rules of beatmaking to focus almost exclusively on snare drum backbeats. Advanced students might consider adding additional drum tracks to provide more variety in drum parts. They might also try to assemble custom drum kits from individual samples.

8.7.10. During Work Time You can best support creative work through back-​and-​forth dialogue, and students will be more willing to engage if they feel your availability and willingness to spot check. Will prefers to wait for students to actively ask him to check their beats, while Ethan likes to jump in and listen to any project that looks interesting. Your own personality will guide you here.

8.7.11. Assessment Strategies This project should sound somewhat like the arranging clips project in Chapter 7.2, but with customized drumbeats. 8.7.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Clips change together every eight measures. • Snare drum plays backbeats on either beats two and four, or on beat three for a halftime feel. • There is a variety of drum patterns (the project doesn’t rely on the first pattern a student made). 8.7.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • The arrangement flows in a logical way, with a beginning, middle, and end. • Hi-​hat cymbals are not too loud. • A variety of drum sounds or unique samples are used.

References Danielsen, A. (2006). Presence and pleasure: The funk grooves of James Brown and Parliament. Wesleyan University Press. Garcia, L.-​M. (2005). On and on: Repetition as process and pleasure in electronic dance music. Music Theory Online, 11(4), 1–​14. Tamlyn, G. N. (1998). The big beat: Origins and development of snare backbeat and other accompanimental rhythms in rock’n’roll. University of Liverpool.

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8.8. Project Example: Slow Jam 8.8.1. Project Duration Six to seven sessions.

8.8.2. Technical Goals

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• Students will be able to use Push melodic pad mode. (or equivalent tools). • Students will access a scale selector and be able to compose in any key. • Students will become familiar with software instruments and accessing their parameters.

8.8.3. Creative Goals • Students will use the concepts of verse, chorus, and bridge in an original composition. • Students will write chord progressions and accompaniments that make sense musically. • Students will write their own melodies, based on the idea of simple riffs. • Students will choose instruments that are meant to sound like those that would go together in an established genre of music.

8.8.4. Listening Examples • Smokey Robinson, “Quiet Storm” (1975) • Midnight Star, “Slow Jam” (1983) • Cyndi Lauper, “Time After Time” (1983) • Sade, “Smooth Operator” (1984) • Lauryn Hill, “Nothing Even Matters” [feat. D’Angelo] (1998) • Daughter, “Youth” (2013) • Caribou, “Back Home” (2014) • Mac DeMarco, “Chamber of Reflection” (2014) • Carly Rae Jepsen, “All That” (2015) • M83, “Go!” [feat. Mai Lan] (2016)

8.8.5. Before Teaching This Lesson “Slow jam” is less a genre and more a mood. Every pop genre has its version of the slow jam, from the power ballad in rock to the chillout room in dance music. The term “slow jam” possibly originated with the 1983 Midnight Star song of the same name. In the 1980s and 1990s, it referred to an R&B subgenre that was coextensive with the radio format known as “Quiet Storm,” named for the 1975 Smokey Robinson song. Contemporary slow jams and pop ballads mostly follow the R&B template. If you are using Live and Push, you should become familiar with melodic pads mode. Consider creating a default set (a project file that loads as a template on launching Ableton Live) that includes helpful starting instruments, such as drums, bass, and keys (Figure 8.18).

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Figure 8.18 A default Live set including synth, drum rack, and 808 bass instruments.

135  8.8.6. Project Design This is the first project in the book where students create completely original material: melodic, rhythmic, and conceptual ideas starting from a blank session file. Will usually notices a jump in students’ creativity after they get through the slow jam project. The defining feature of the slow jam format is relaxed tempo, 100 BPM or less. At these tempos, students will be able to compose melodies and chord progressions without struggling to keep up with the metronome. There are three phases to this project: making beats, making accompaniment, and making melodies. Students will create at least three distinct drum clips. They will then make a four-​bar chord progression and copy it to other instruments for variety, with or without arpeggiators. They will also turn the chord clip into a bassline. Finally, they will make at least three eight-​bar melody clips using the riff/​duplicate/​fill-​in-​the-​gap method. The key musical takeaway from this project is the idea of song form and hypermeter (Stephenson, 2002, pp. 4–​8). So far, we have defined song sections as being eight bars long, but students have been making clips that are one or two bars long. We will continue to build sections of loops of loops, but this time the loops will be of differing lengths. In the slow jam, drum clips will be two bars long, accompaniment clips will be four bars long, and melodies will be eight bars long. If you are using Push, you should adjust the Fixed Length setting accordingly. Students should choose instrumentation that suits their own aesthetic preferences. If they want to make a rock power ballad, they can use acoustic drums and electric guitars. If they want a hip-​hop or R&B sound, they should use drum machines, sub bass, and synthesizers. The important thing is that they get familiar with the functional roles (rhythm, harmony, and melody) that instruments play in the virtual ensemble of their track. You will notice that in our explanation of chord progressions, we make no effort to explain the concept of chord function. This is because the chords in loop-​based pop songs don’t really “function” at all; they mostly exist to signpost where you are in the meter. For an in-​depth explanation of this concept, see Philip Tagg’s book Everyday Tonality (2009). Contemporary pop songs are more like modal jazz than like classical compositions where harmony is a structuring element. As of this writing, a significant number of songs on the radio do not even have a clear tonic (McKinney, 2016). This ambiguity can be a desirable effect if students want a moodier or more angst-​ridden feel.

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8.8.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 8.8.7.1. Session 1: Note Mode and Chords If you are using piano-​style MIDI controllers, have students play triads on the white keys: pick any note, then play every third note above it. Use three-​note chords for a simpler sound and four-​note chords for a more complex, jazzier sound. Do not require students to start on C; let them find their own tonics. They are just as likely to gravitate to A natural minor or G Mixolydian mode. If you are using Live and Push, have students use Note Mode. Using our default set, you should have a grand piano already set as the default selected track. Before you dive into chord building, add a track and choose a mellow-​sounding instrument from the Synth Keys category. Some talking points to remember about Push Note Mode:

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• Scale steps go from left to right. • Moving up or down a column is equivalent to a fourth, as on the bottom four strings of a guitar. • Blue pads are the root note of the key you are in (the tonic). • Low notes are on the bottom, and high notes are on top. • When you push a pad, other pads will light up in green to show that they are the same note. This is because the symmetrical layout of the Push note grid repeats periodically (again, like a guitar fretboard). In Note mode, triads form a distinctive triangle shape. To make a tonic chord, play a triangle with the blue pad in its lower left corner (Figure 8.19). Give students a few minutes to experiment with the triangle across different note ranges, and with other chord shapes as well (Figure 8.20).

Figure 8.19 A triad chord in Root position on Push. “The blue pad is on the left of the triangle” is a good mnemonic for students to remember a good starting chord.

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Figure 8.20 Triads can be made out of other shapes, too. Here are two ways to play inversions of a basic triad chord.

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(b)

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After a bit of experimentation, have students press the Scales button. Few of them will know what scales are or how they work. They can select different keys while trying different root notes until they find one they like—​unless they have absolute pitch, all of the keys will be interchangeable. Next, they should choose between major and minor scales. (If they want to use something more exotic, that is fine, but they will have an easier time keeping things diatonic.) Students can test out their scale by playing a root position triad (a triangle shape with the blue pad on the left). Once students have chosen their key and scale, they can record a four-​chord structure to the metronome, with one chord per measure. Hold the Fixed Length button on Push and make sure the Push menu indicates “4 bars.” Also make sure that the Fixed Length button is lit up, since it can be difficult to tell—​you can toggle it a few times to make sure. Press Record and hold down a root position triangle at the start of the clip. Each time you hear a high-​pitched click (a downbeat), switch to a different chord. If record quantization is off, you can press Quantize to make sure that chords line up exactly with the downbeats. This procedure is mostly foolproof, with a few caveats. If the chords jump around too far from the starting position, they will sound disjointed and strange. Also, students should probably avoid diminished triads (the vii° chord in major and the ii° chord in minor), as they do not sound idiomatically appropriate in contemporary pop styles. To obtain smooth voice leading on Push, you can think in terms of chess moves. The triangle is the King, and it can move one space in any direction (up, down, diagonally, left, or right). In major, be careful not to move one step left of root position to avoid the viiº chord. In minor, avoid moving one step right of root position to avoid the iiº chord (Figure 8.21). In summary, here is how the Push reduces the first year of college music theory to three rules: 1. Always start your triangle with the blue pad on the left. 2. Move in any direction one square, except . . . 3. Don’t initially go left if you’re in major, and don’t initially go right if you’re in minor. After five or six tries, the whole class should be able to write good-​sounding chord progressions (Figure 8.22). 8.8.7.2. Session 2: Accompaniments and Bass Some students will be saturated with all of the new information about chord progressions, so they will need plenty of practice time to allow things to sink in. Fortunately, we will be getting lots of mileage out of these chord progressions, by copying and pasting the existing clips onto other tracks to get different kinds of accompaniments. Right now, students have block chords being played on a mellow synth keyboard instrument. Next, they will add another synth keyboard instrument and put an arpeggiator effect on it. This time, have them choose a pluckier, more staccato sound. Finally, they should duplicate the chord clips and place the duplicates on this new track. Instruct them that in Live, they should: • Right-​click each clip from the last session and change the color of each clip—​the color coding will ensure that these aren’t mismatched later.

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Figure 8.21 Directions for moving the chord triangle to adjacent in-​key chords. The “No” square indicated would cause an undesirable diminished chord to be played.

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Figure 8.22 Block chords made using triads.

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Figure 8.23

(a)

The same block chords from the Chords track, used on the Arp track. Adding an arpeggiator creates broken note patterns from the block chords.

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• Copy a chord progression clip from the last session and paste it on the new track, making sure that it’s in the same row/​scene. • From MIDI Effects, add an arpeggiator to the new “plucky” synth track. When the students play the clip, they should now hear arpeggios rather than block chords. Have the class take a few moments to appreciate the arpeggiator and play around its parameters. Students are usually impressed with this function and will want to experiment with it. To create a bassline, repeat the same procedure, but this time use a bass instrument on the new track. Students can manually shift each chord down an octave or two and delete all notes except the lowest one. They can also use an arpeggiator on the bass track, but they should keep the rate slow (e.g., eighth notes rather than sixteenth notes). By the end of this session, the students should have at least three tracks: Chords (whole measures of held-​down chords), Bass (add eighth-​note arpeggiator and remove top notes from chords) (Figure 8.24), and Arp (leave the chords intact, add faster arpeggiator) (Figure 8.23). Students should have at least three scenes that go together for each track. 8.8.7.3. Session 3: Drums, Form After they have spent the first few days making melodic and harmonic material, have the class spend a session writing drum parts and organizing their material into scenes. While drum programming is covered in sections 8.6 and 8.7, it is a big subject that is worth reviewing. Also, you will want to give students enough time to make more customized and interesting beats. Remember a few rules of thumb for drum programming: • The snare drum should almost always go on beats two and four (steps five and thirteen on a sixteenth-​note grid; the fifth column on Push; three o’clock and nine o’clock on the Groove Pizza).

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(b)

• The kick drum can follow a template pattern like four-​on-​the-​floor or tresillo (3 + 3 + 2). You can then modify the template into a unique pattern by adding or removing a few notes here and there. • Hi-​hats should play fast, repetitive patterns. Start with every eighth note or every sixteenth note, then add some extras and/​or leave some gaps. Don’t mix the hi-​hats too loud. Beyond these simple guidelines, encourage exploration. Since students already have some experience creating drumbeats from two previous projects, they can push themselves harder here. Live automatically assigns the same color to clips that are created on the same track. For this project, however, we recommend color-​coding the clips so that the ones using the same chord progression share the same color. When you copy the same chord pattern from the chords track onto the bass and arp tracks, those clips will probably only sound good playing with each other, and not with the other variations. You should also group same-​ colored clips together in the same scene to prevent harmonic mismatching. If space allows, leave an empty scene between each of the scenes for additional visual reinforcement. 8.8.7.4. Sessions 3 to 5: Melodies Writing melodies is the most difficult element of this project, and we recognize that it is an ambitious undertaking for a beginner-​level course. If you provide enough scaffolding and support, however, it is within reach even for complete novices. You can take some of the pressure off by eliminating the most culturally fraught element: lyrics. Ambitious students can add lyrics if they want, but creating instrumentals will be plenty of challenge for most of them. There is a good reason why so many classic songwriting teams divide up labor between composers and lyricists, like Elton John and Bernie Taupin—​see Bennett (2011) for a good rundown. Have students add a new track for their melodies. Any pitched instrument sound will work. The melodies need to be singable and memorable. This can be accomplished by first coming up with a short phrase to say in place of lyrics, and then finding notes to match

Figure 8.24 The same block chords from the Chords track, used on the Bass track. Removing the upper notes of the triads and then adding a slow arpeggiator creates repeated chord roots and octaves that can be a very passable bass line. Pitch devices set to –​12 semitones are used to lower the notes into bass range with minimal MIDI editing.

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it. Writing to nonsense syllables is a time-​honored strategy, famously embraced by the Beatles. Paul McCartney wrote “Yesterday” to the syllables “Scrambled eggs, oh my baby how I love your legs” (Vincent, 2015). The phrases you and the students use can be similarly meaningless, and should only be a few syllables in length. Have students play an accompaniment scene while trying to say a short phrase (you might use TV show names like Orange Is the New Black, The Bachelor, or Stranger Things) over and over again. Memorable melodies usually have repeating phrases. Copy-​ and-​ paste is the songwriter’s friend. On Push, use the Fixed Length and Double Loop features:

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• Hold the Fixed Length button and set the length to Four Bars (if it isn’t already). • Press Record and watch the screen. • Play a melody only for the first half of the four bars (half of the box). You will need to demonstrate melody-​writing technique to the class. We recommend that your melody start on the tonic (the lowest note in the first chord). On the Push, aim for the blue pads. Say your phrase at a natural speed as many times as the clip length allows. Stop early if needed: “Stranger Things, Stranger Things, Stran—​” when the playback reaches measure three. Restrict your note choices to a small group of white keys (a single row on Push), and restrict melodic leaps to no more than one white key or pad at a time. This yields a recording of half a melody: two bars with notes, and two empty bars. To fill in the rest, duplicate this phrase and answer each riff with a slightly different phrase. On Push: • Press Double Loop (while the recording is still going—​if you pressed Stop, just hit Record again). • Visually follow the notes playing back on the grid, and be ready to pick up when the recording reaches to the gap. • On the first gap, finish the melody by playing lower notes than the ones that are already there. • On the second gap, finish the melody by playing higher notes—​only play the highest note once. You have just demonstrated how to write a pop-​ready melody with lyrical intent and a peak note. Students will want lots of practice doing this, so encourage them to attempt several melodies and to keep all of their experiments—​they will be ranking them later. We have observed that many students want to watch you run through the melody-​writing technique multiple times to internalize the process. Consider using pentatonic scales rather than seven-​note scales. On a piano-​style controller, use MIDI transpose so that the black keys play C major or A minor pentatonic. On Push, use the Scales button to change your major or minor scale to major pentatonic or minor pentatonic. This will produce simpler, cleaner-​sounding melodies. Some students will need more time for melody writing than others. Those who write quickly can spend class time exploring alternative instrument combinations that evoke a specific genre. They may be amazed to discover how a simple change in instrumentation can make the same MIDI sequence sound like a hair-​metal power ballad, a Vangelis science fiction score, or a string quartet.

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Figure 8.25 This melody has an identical two-​bar riff starting on measures one and five. The two-​bar segments in between the riff provide an “answer” either higher or lower than the initial riff.

Figure 8.26 Slow jam project in Ableton Live’s Session View. The scene marked Chorus has a stronger melody clip than the Verse and Bridge scenes (as judged by the person who made the song).

By the end of this session, everyone should have at least three accompaniment/​drum scenes and several (five or more) melody options (Figure 8.25). 8.8.7.5. Sessions 5 to 6: Ranking Melodies, Organizing the Top Three Remember when we learned about verse, chorus, and bridge? Now the students can apply their knowledge of form to their clips. As they are working with their melodies and instrumentation, ask them to do two things: 1. Align their melody clips with their best matching accompaniment clips—​on Push, place them in the same row. 2. Decide which group/​scene (accompaniment plus melody) is the best, which is the second best, and which is the third best. Based on your rankings, rename the scenes. The best one should be labeled Chorus, the second best one should be labeled Verse, and the third best should be labeled Bridge. This is not too far from real-​world pop songwriting practice. With the section labels in place, the song sections can be organized on the timeline. On Push, record the scenes into Arrangement View, triggering the scenes in a typical pop form. A standard sequence would be: Verse 1, Chorus 1, Verse 2, Chorus 2, Bridge, Chorus 3, Chorus 4. Listen to real songs for inspiration on form. You can also consult Ethan’s collection of song form visualizations (Hein, 2012). Have students trigger a new scene every eight measures—​they can either count high-​pitched clicks using the metronome or watch the timer in the Transport control, triggering the next scene after the clock hits 8.0.0, 16.0.0, 24.0.0, and so on. The students will now have a 100% original song, with drums, accompaniment, and melodies, organized into eight-​bar phrases with a pop form, and with the strongest melodies as choruses (Figure 8.26).

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8.8.7.6. Session 7: Finishing In Live, after the song is recorded into Arrangement View, this view has to be unlocked using the orange button in the top right of the screen. Before declaring the track finished, have students give their production and arrangement some polish (Figure 8.27). Here are a few strategies for taking these blocks of music and turning them into something with a more organic flow: Strategy #1: Add by Removing Try removing small segments from sections, especially the Verse and Bridge. Since the Chorus is usually the loudest part of the song, you can create a stronger contrast by leaving more empty space in the other sections. You can also divide sections into subsections; for example, try having the bass enter halfway through the first verse, or remove the drums from the first half of the second verse. But don’t get carried away; keep enough material constant from one section to the next that the sections hang together. The song will have the most dramatic momentum if there is a balance between continuity and surprise, with greater contrast during the first verse and the bridge. Listen closely to songs on the radio for inspiration.

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Strategy #2: Fuzzy Boundaries You can attain smoother transitions by having clip edges extend across section boundaries. For example, if a Chorus starts on measure 9, have its melody pick up during measure 8. You may need to modify the material in order for this to work. It’s worth the effort! Will describes the effect as the music sounding like it knows the chorus is about to happen, which creates a sense of anticipation. Figure 8.27 Finished slow jam project as an arrangement with eight-​bar sections.

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Strategy #3: Musical Duct Tape You can build musical interest in transitions between sections using sweeps, impacts, whooshes, risers, and other noise-​based effects. In rock, the cymbal crash is the most common form of musical punctuation, but electronic styles are just as likely to use reversed crashes or abrupt silence to grab listener attention. You can find good transition sounds on freesound.org. Make sure these effects are not mixed too loud. Strategy #4: Beginning and Ending Should the song fade in? Should it fade out at the end? Should the parts peel off one by one until only the bassline is left? Should there be a drum intro before the actual song starts? This is where the real creativity in pop production lies. No matter what, make sure the ending is more interesting than just having the song stop dead at the end of the last measure. It always sounds okay to use a fadeout, but Ethan nicknames it “the coward’s ending” and pushes more advanced students to think of something more distinctive. Dennis DeSantis’ book Making Music (2015) is full of interesting ideas and suggestions for endings.

8.8.8.  Troubleshooting 8.8.8.1. My Parts Never Loop/​My Parts Are the Wrong Length If the Fixed Length button is turned off on Push, recordings will be open ended. It is sometimes difficult to tell the state of this button, since it is only slightly dimmer when turned off. Before recording anything with students, have them double-​check that Fixed Length is on. Once they do this, it will likely stay this way throughout the project. Also, keep an eye on chord progressions that look longer or shorter than four measures—​sometimes the Fixed length setting gets changed independently of the default set. 8.8.8.2. Nothing Sounds Good Together Make sure that accompaniment parts that were made from the same MIDI clip are played together. It’s a good idea to color-​code these clips to match. Otherwise, the melodies won’t match the chords. 8.8.8.3. I Can’t Come up with Melodies It takes lots of practice to write a convincing-​sounding melody. Students will often make theirs too complex or busy. You can help by giving them a smaller set of notes to choose from. Set the Push to one of the pentatonic scales and establish some rules: for example, they can only use twelve notes over four bars. You can also give the student a starting idea; give them the first half of a melody and then have them complete it. Once they experience finishing a successful melody, they will usually be able to start another one on their own. 8.8.8.4. My Song Still Sounds Weird/​Wrong Near the end of the project, have students reassess their instrument choices now that the parts are written. When a student says that their song doesn’t sound right, suggest instrument changes as a first fix. Sometimes parts that sound awkward on one instrument

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will sound fine on another. Trying alternative instrument sounds is good practice, and it models the way that real-​world producers work.

8.8.9. Differentiated Instruction

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Advanced students will not need much help to push this assignment further out. They will be motivated by the challenge of writing a completely original track, and they will want to work hard to perfect their melodies and accompaniment parts. If they do finish early, they can try to improve their mix using compression or EQ. They also might enjoy writing and recording lyrics. Students struggling with part writing or missing school during the accompaniment phase of this project will need help setting up their tracks. You can help by providing a “tracks only” template of the project to allow them to catch up quickly. If you make sure that their accompaniments are well organized and color-​coded, they will have fewer mismatch problems in the finished product. Finally, don’t be shy about giving a part “for free” every now and then. The less advanced students find it helpful to have a clip or two that they know will sound good. Of course, try to solve problems using material that the students have generated whenever possible!

8.8.10. During Work Time The early part of this project is tightly prescribed to scaffold the creative challenges of melody writing. After each set of steps (drums, accompaniments, and melodies), spot check and offer to fix problems along the way. If a student misses or doesn’t accurately follow a given set of steps, they will definitely fall behind during the next part, and they will wonder why your demo project sounds so much better than theirs. The melody writing portion will require the most one-​on-​one time.

8.8.11. Assessment Strategies 8.8.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Tracks include drums, bass, arpeggiator, chords, and melody. • Accompaniment tracks are set up correctly and are playing pitches in the right range. • Tempo is between 60 and 90 BPM. • Melodies demonstrate duplicated riff-​and-​answer structure. • There is a recognizable pop song form: Verse/​Chorus/​Verse/​Chorus/​Bridge/​Chorus/​ Chorus or similar. 8.8.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Instrument choices and combinations make stylistic sense—​they could possibly “be in the same band.” • There is a good mix between melody, accompaniments and drums—​the melody is not swamped by the accompaniment. • There is attention to detail in the arrangement, especially during transitions from scene to scene.

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References Bennett, J. (2011). Collaborative songwriting—​The ontology of negotiated creativity in popular music studio practice. Journal on the Art of Record Production, (5). https://www. arpjournal.com/asarpwp/collaborative-songwriting-%E2%80%93-the-ontology-ofnegotiated-creativity-in-popular-music-studio-practice/ DeSantis, D. (2015). Making music: 74 creative strategies for electronic music producers. Ableton AG. Hein, E. (2012). Visualizing song structures. ethanhein.com/​wp/​2012/​song-​structures/​ McKinney, K. (2016). The music theory principle that unifies 2016’s radio hits. Vox. vox.com/​culture/​2016/​12/​26/​13956220/​top-​40-​ambiguous-​key-​centers-​bieber-​chainsmokers-​adele Stephenson, K. (2002). What to listen for in rock: A stylistic analysis. Yale University Press. Tagg, P. (2009). Everyday tonality. Mass Media Music Scholars Press. Vincent, A. (2015). Yesterday: The song that started as Scrambled Eggs. The Telegraph. telegraph.co.uk/​culture/​music/​the-​beatles/​11680415/​Yesterday-​the-​song-​that-​started-​as-​ Scrambled-​Eggs.html

8.9. Project Example: Future Bass 8.9.1. Project Duration Seven to eight sessions.

8.9.2. Technical Goals • Students will employ automatic chord-​building tools to create complex harmony. • Students will use EQ to make pitched percussion. • Students will synthesize previously learned mixing techniques to create a rich MIDI-​ based song.

8.9.3. Creative Goals • Students will learn how to apply seventh chords to express more nuanced harmonies. • Students will create a unique vocabulary of synth textures to lead to an idiomatic-​ sounding “drop.” • Students will manage anticipation and emotive release through dramatic rise and drop sections.

8.9.4. Listening Examples 8.9.4.1. Future Bass • Porter Robinson, “Sad Machine” (2014) • Odesza, “Sun Models” [feat. Madelyn Grant] (2014) • Flume, “Never Be Like You” [feat. Kai] (2016) • Point Point, “All This” (2016) • Alison Wonderland, “Peace” [Kaivon remix] (2019) • San Holo, “Light” (2017) • Petit Biscuit, “Safe” (2018)

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8.9.4.2.  Dubstep • Skream, “Midnight Request Line” (2006) • Burial, “Archangel” (2007) • Benny Benassi, “Cinema” [Skrillex remix] (2011) 8.9.4.3. EDM-​Focused Trap

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• Nosaj Thing, “Coat of Arms” (2009) • Big Chocolate, “Blue Milk” (2012) • Hudson Mohawke, “Chimes” (2015) • Carnage & Milo & Otis, “RGV” (2015)

8.9.5. Before Teaching This Lesson This project is one of the most advanced in the book. It requires you to understand the methods involved well enough to know how to simplify them to a reasonable number of steps for your students. As projects become more complex, they will involve more trial and error, and that can make it difficult to structure them. Genre-​based projects require that you do a detailed breakdown of the genre’s musical characteristics, gather listening examples, and craft a narrative of how the genre came to be. It also requires that you create your own demo version of the project in advance. As you create your demo project, document the steps you took; this will be the procedure for your students to follow. As is discussed in Chapter 6, you need to be aware of how much work students can handle. They will usually work more slowly than you do, and the pace gets slower as the group gets larger. If a task takes you ten minutes, it might take a group thirty minutes. If you are very adept, a project that takes you half an hour might take a group of novice teenagers an entire week of regular class time. Students may not recognize the term “future bass,” but they will definitely know the sound from the background music in YouTube vlogs. Your demo track will need to sound convincingly authentic.

8.9.6. Project Design Will based this project on a parodic YouTube tutorial, “How to Make a Future Bass Banger in 5 Minutes!” by DeliFB (2016). On his video, DeliFB comments: I’m pretty sure that we can all come to the conclusion that you really cannot make a full track ready to be released for the public to listen to with that clean, crisp mastering, in just 5 minutes. These “In Under 5 Minutes” videos are made just to provide a basis on how to make a future bass track, what you can get started in just 5 minutes. I recommend spending more time on these. This perfectly summarizes our approach. We want to introduce our students to a style, give them the tools to get started, and see what happens from there. Some will go through the motions and may not even like what they made, but at least they will have been exposed to new ideas. Some students will love creating but will struggle without a demo from a teacher. Most excitingly, some students will discover that they are able

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to create independently, and they will use a project like this as a starting point to find their own voice. Do this project for yourself first at least once before teaching it.

8.9.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 8.9.7.1. Session 1: Intro and the Beat Future bass is a good jumping-​off point for discussing subgenres in general. Electronic music treats its subgenres differently from other styles. In rock, you can identify prog, grunge, metal, and so on, and aficionados will be able to list several bands and regional movements within each style, spanning many decades. Any more narrow descriptor will probably refer to the sound of a specific band. By contrast, electronic music subgenres are copious and short-​lived. Sometimes a subgenre can spring from a single track by a single artist. For example, Moombahton was inspired by DJ Dave Nada’s slowing down the tempo of Afrojack’s remix of “Moombah” by Silvio Ecomo & Chuckie (2009) (Yenigun, 2011). Another reason for the proliferation of microgenres is that dance music producers strive to create a unique sound, brand, and performance niche. Skrillex, Flume, and Hudson Mohawke are all EDM artists, but it is more accurate to say that Skrillex makes dubstep, Flume makes future bass, and Hudson Mohawke makes trap. You can decide for yourself how important it is to do deep dives on subgenres and their development with your students, and how you might adapt the examples and stories to their interests. 8.9.7.2. Future Beats Dance music should start with the drums. Set the session tempo to 140 BPM. You will be following trap/​dubstep convention and working in halftime, so you will place your snares on beat three rather than beats two and four. Find a drum kit with a big snare drum sound. If you are working in Live, create a new empty Drum Rack. On the left sidebar, click Drums, then Drum Hits. Find a good snare and drag it into the empty Drum Rack. Program a full velocity snare on beat three. On Push, you can do this by pressing the Accent button and lighting up the first pad in the second and fourth rows. Layering snares is the key to making a big, radio-​ready sound. Combine multiple snare drums that sound different from each other. You can use EQ to give a strong pitch to a snare by boosting specific frequencies. The Singing C preset on Live’s EQ Eight is an expedient way to do this. Add reverb to enhance the effect. Note that it is easiest to apply different effects chains to different drum sounds when they are on separate tracks. This is why professional EDM producers’ session files have dozens or hundreds of tracks. For the kick pattern, use a tresillo (3 + 3 + 2) rhythm. On the Push, activate the first and seventh pads on the first row, and the fifth pad on the second row. For hi-​hat patterns, use the Repeat function to record some constant rhythms with sporadic rolls (switch between eighth and thirty-​second note intervals while holding the hi-​hat pad down with your other hand). It will be more satisfying to program other parts over these drum patterns than over the metronome.

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Figure 8.28

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Device chain for making chords from a single note. Major Chord has an added +11 shift, creating a major seventh chord. The Scale device set to C Major filters the Maj7 chords to be diatonic chords in the key of C major, feeding the new notes to the Future Bass Chord Lead instrument.

8.9.7.3. Session 2: Chords The EDM equivalent of a chorus is the drop: the loudest, most energetic, and memorable part of the song. Begin this session by making the lead synth for your drop. Choose a loud, hypersaw-​type sound (made by combining many sawtooth waves). To save time, you can distribute a premade instrument rather than spend a lot of time on sound design. EDM uses seventh chords voiced in thirds. You can play these on the white keys of the piano simply by playing every third note. On the Push grid in Scales mode, seventh chords make a distinctive shape on the grid that you can easily transpose. You can also create diatonic seventh chords by playing single notes using Live’s MIDI effects. This approach is alienating for formally trained pianists, but it will appeal to electronic musicians. You can also make these chords using only the computer keyboard. • Create an instrument track with an appropriately aggressive synth lead. • Add a Chord device with the Major Chord preset to the track. This will turn each note you play into a major triad. • Add a Scale device set to the C Major preset after the Chord device. This will map all of the notes coming from the Chord device to the closest note in the C major scale. Now when you play any MIDI note, Live will play a diatonic major triad (Figure 8.28). Next, set the Chord device to play seventh chords rather than triads. Currently, the effect will have Shift 1 (+4 ST) and Shift 2 (+7 ST) already set. This means that the effect is adding notes four semitones and seven semitones above the input note. Set Shift 3 to +11 semitones to add a seventh to the chord. It is most expedient to keep everyone’s projects in C major, but you can transpose projects into different keys by changing the root setting on the Scale effect. 8.9.7.4. Chord Clips Next, you will place chords so they follow the same tresillo rhythm as the kick drum. You can do this by playing live on the keyboard, by drawing the notes into the MIDI piano roll, or by using the Push sequencing mode: • Make sure you are in Note mode with the synth lead track selected. • Press Layout twice to change to Melodic Sequence + 32 notes mode. • Press Clip (in the top right of Push) to see the MIDI pattern on screen.

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This mode on Push lets you use the bottom half of the pads as a keyboard and the top half as a sequencer. Whichever note you pressed last will stay lit up and be represented in the sequence. You can get richer chords by using all twelve chromatic pitches rather than just the white keys. When you play the black keys on the piano, the MIDI devices will still prevent you from playing any “wrong” notes. Instead, the black keys will produce in-​key suspended seventh chords that add an extra layer of sophistication to the chord voicings. To get this effect on Push, switch to Chromatic mode: • Press Scale. • Press the skinny button below the screen under the In Key item to change it to Chromatic.

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You should now see some unlit keys appear in the bottom half of the pad layout, which means that all of the chromatic pitches are available. To sequence the tresillo chord pattern on Push: • Place notes on the first and seventh pads in the first row. • Place a note on the fifth pad in the second row. • Leave the third and fourth rows blank. • Press Double Loop to make a second half to the loop identical to the first half. • Turn the Zoom knob to the left to zoom the Clip view out. You can see that the first half is highlighted. Press the Page Left/​Right arrow in the lower left of Push to focus your pads on the second half of the loop. • Keep the notes on the same beats, but change their pitches. You will now have a solid chord pattern that follows lots of future bass tropes. Have students create a few more chord clips like this as practice and to add some variety. They should feel free to play around with the rhythms, but they should make least one that follows the tresillo rhythm (Figure 8.29). Also, try changing the length of individual notes. On Push: • Press Clip again to make sure you’re in Clip View (you can only make this adjustment in Clip View). • Hold down the pad that you want to play a longer or shorter note. • A few new controls will appear above the screen on Push. Find the knob above Length and adjust as needed. You will see the length of the note change on the Push screen. It sounds especially good to make the third note of your pattern a little longer (before the four count rest) so the snare drum on beat three cuts off the note.

Figure 8.29 Tresillo rhythm in a chord clip. These single notes create four-​note chords through the devices shown in Figure 8.28.

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Now you can use an extreme shortcut to turn your chords into matching melodic lines. Simply duplicate the chord track, transpose it up an octave, and remove the MIDI Chord device. In Live:

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• Right-​click the track title of your chord lead track and select Duplicate. • Double-​click the duplicate track’s title to show devices in the bottom panel. • Disable the Major Chord device by clicking the button in the upper right corner of the device. • Double-​click the clip on the duplicated track. • Edit the MIDI clip by raising the pitch of each note, while keeping it on the same rhythm as the chords. • Make these notes a little longer than the notes in the chords to allow them to stick out in the mix. The notes will be in key automatically, but it will take some trial and error to get the right emotional impact. Make one melody clip for each chord pattern in the first track and feel free to experiment with more or fewer notes. Also, make sure to mix so that the melody is not buried under the chords. Who said writing melodies was hard? 8.9.7.5. Sessions 3 to 6: 808 Bass As you would expect from the name, bass is critical to future bass. The go-​to bass sound for the genre is a sampled TR-​808 drum machine’s kick sound, which is really just a sine wave with a transient pop at the beginning that helps it cut through a mix. Ableton Live has a decent preset instrument called sub808bass, but its pitch is unstable. You may prefer to make your own 808 bass, or have students do it themselves. There are endless 808 kick samples available online. In Live: • Make a new Simpler track. • Click Samples in the left sidebar and type “808” in the search field. • Find the sound titled “Kick Sub 808 Long C1” and drag it into the area labelled “Drop Sample Here” in Simpler. • Click 1-​Shot in Simpler to allow the entire sample to play with each pad press. This also turns warping off, which eliminates unstable pitch issues. The 808 kick was intended to drive club sound systems with big subwoofers, and it may be too low to be audible on computer speakers or earbuds. You can use compression, saturation, and/​or EQ to boost the 808’s upper overtones to make them more audible. Live’s Drum Buss effect is an expedient way to do this. Be careful not to make to the 808 too loud, though; when you transfer your track to a better speaker system, you don’t want to blow out the subwoofers! You can use EQ to lower everything below 40 or 50 Hz, which will prevent unexpected low-​end booming. To create a bassline, simply duplicate the chord clips without the MIDI effects. You may need to raise or lower the pitches by an octave. In Live, you can do this using the Pitch MIDI device—​set it to +12 semitones or –​12 semitones as needed. You have now created the drop, the heaviest/​loudest part of the song. Remember that in future bass and other pop EDM genres, the drop has the same role as the chorus (Harding, 2016). You can make other sections (intro, verse, etc.) by duplicating and adjusting the drop.

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8.9.7.6. Sidechain Compression To get an authentic sound, you will need to sidechain compress both the chord lead track and the 808 bass tracks to produce an extreme ducking effect each time the kick drum plays. In Live: • Add a Glue Compressor to the chord lead track. • Click the triangle in the upper left of Glue Compressor to show sidechain controls and activate Sidechain. • Change No Input to your kick drum by selecting the Drum Rack track. In the next pulldown box, select your kick drum sound.

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Now the compressor is “listening” to the kick drum, and the needle should move each time the kick drum plays (Figure 8.30). Lower the Threshold until the needle moves a lot when the kick drum hits, and adjust the Ratio to its highest setting. Repeat these steps for your 808 bass, but keep the Threshold a little higher for a milder ducking effect. You can also simulate sidechain compression with devices like Pump, a Max for Live device (found at https://​patches.zone) that automatically ducks the volume of a track on every beat (Figure 8.31).

Figure 8.30 Compressor, set to sidechain and placed on the Chords track. Sidechaining to the Trap Beats track means the volume level of the Chords track will be adjusted down when peaks are heard in the Trap Beats track.

Figure 8.31 Pump, a device by pATCHES that simulates a common sidechain compression effect.

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8.9.7.8. Quiet Versions of the Loud Parts In this portion of the project, students can spread out from your template and explore their own unique ideas. In future bass songs, the drop tends to stick to genre tropes, while intros are more varied and show more of the producer’s particular sensibilities. The intro should be in the same key and tempo as the drop, but otherwise it can depart widely. The easiest way to create quiet sections is to simply duplicate the drop and change the instruments to quieter ones. For example:

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• Swap the snare drum for finger snaps, and omit the pitched snare. • Swap a percussive “pluck” synth for the long future bass chord lead tracks. • Don’t use the 808 bass. • Add an arpeggiator to the chord parts and/​or the melody part. • Add delay—​ping-​pong works great—​to make the parts sound more ambient and mysterious. These guidelines are intentionally less specific than the ones for the drop. Will recommends separating the intro and verse scenes spatially in Session View by placing them all far away from the drop scenes. Use labels as necessary to make the rows appear visually distinct from the drop scenes. 8.9.7.9. Snare Rolls Rather than doing a brash accelerating snare pattern like one in the house music project (Chapter 8.10), Will likes to show students a more tasteful Flume-​like snare roll method. You will take a dry 808 snare and add a fast arpeggiator to make it roll. In Live: • Create an empty Simpler track. • Click Drums in the left sidebar. • Click the triangle next to Drum Hits. • Type “808” into the search field. • Choose one of the snare drum sounds and drag it into the “Drop Sample Here” area of Simpler. You will now have a track that changes pitch like a keyboard but that plays a snare drum sound. On Push: • Make sure Fixed Length is turned on. • Record a two-​bar pattern of random descending notes. • After recording, make sure there is a note on beat one. If there isn’t, create one. • Press the Legato button to make all the snare notes full length (you won’t hear a difference in sound yet). Now you have a clip that consistently triggers a snare that descends in pitch (Figure 8.32). You can make it roll by adding an arpeggiator. In Live, the default arpeggiator setting will produce repeating eighth notes on the snare. To make this an interesting roll pattern, automate the Rate setting. • Right-​click the Rate knob in Arpeggiator and click Show Automation. • Press B to change the cursor to Pencil mode. • Play the clip. It should start repeating.

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Figure 8.32 Descending MIDI notes for the snare roll. Selecting Legato as shown in the bottom part of the figure makes the notes sustain to fill in empty space, allowing you to continue triggering the arpeggiator.

(b)

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Figure 8.33 Automation of the arpeggiator’s Rate parameter. Using devices in this way can be technically challenging, but can save a lot of time compared to manually programming complex rhythms.

• Draw in automation until you’re happy with the snare roll. Remember that the “lower” values on the graph will sound faster on playback (Figure 8.33). • Finally, deactivate the Loop setting. You can trigger your snare roll manually right before the drop, or place it in Arrangement View later. 8.9.7.10. The Birdie The “birdie” is a basic mono synth sound with a lot of glide applied to it. If you like, you can create this instrument ahead of time and distribute it to students. They can use it over their drop, or as its own melodic element. Short taps produce a pluck synth sound, and longer legato notes cause a short glide. Classical musicians might call this a “descant”—​it overlies the main melody but is a softer decorative element rather than a central focus. Have students try to include at least one birdie over their drop. 8.9.7.11. Voice Chops This is an optional part using Simpler. Load a voice part into Simpler’s Slicing Playback Mode (labeled Slice) and use Note Repeat on the Push to chop it into fragments. You

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can demonstrate this with an a cappella track from the simple remix project, or with any vocal clip. 8.9.7.12. Sessions 7 to 9: Connecting the Two Sections

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You have now guided students through all the track design portions of this project. It’s time to zoom out and think of the product as a cohesive song with intro and drop sections. Play some listening examples back to reinforce this idea. As in other advanced projects, the last stage is best suited to self-​guided learning. You will want to demonstrate your project and give targets for each day (e.g., “Everyone should be able to record their tune today” or “Let’s be able to trigger through the song in Session Mode by the end of class today”) and spend your individual time making sure students have all the prior elements they want in their song. Now that you have provided lots of building blocks and tools, students should apply them in their own creative way. If they choose to make something similar to the demo project, that is fine. If they prefer to use the track elements to create something entirely unlike the listening examples, that is also fine. Whatever choices the students are making, be sure to talk them through. It is okay for a student to copy your demo because they are more interested in mixing and sound design than in writing melodies. It is not okay for them to copy you because they don’t feel like coming up with their own ideas. You can determine when they need a nudge to move beyond their comfort zone. Once everyone has recorded their scenes into Arrangement View, keep circulating among individual students to help them realize their vision and/​or to point out what they might do to make their track even more effective.

8.9.8.  Troubleshooting With so many setup steps, students will inevitably miss some of them. Recap the steps as often as necessary. A common mistake is to hear students using the 3 + 3 + 2 tresillo rhythm on the kick, 808, and chord tracks incorrectly. Any musical-​sounding variation on the pattern is fine, but make sure that students have not accidentally made it twice or half as fast as intended. Students may make the chord track incorrectly, and then compound the problem when they copy it to several other tracks. Fix the chord track first, and then copy the new clips to the other tracks as needed. Because there are so many directed steps, students may forget to add their own mixing effects. If a project sounds too dry, with chord notes that are too short or that do not wash as intended, remind the students to add delay or reverb. Similarly, the pitched snare often sticks out, when it should be covered up a bit by the other backbeats present in drum tracks. Students will need some help with mixing. The best practice is for you to make this project along with your students, even if you have already done so on your own for practice. You do not want to be hunting around the menus and looking confused in front of the students. This applies to all of the projects, really, but it can really drag down a complex project like this one.

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8.9.9. Differentiated Instruction Advanced students can take on the challenge of making their tracks sound as professional as possible. Reassure them that they can deviate from your plan and demo project as they work toward their own vision. Less advanced students will need help with missing elements and first clips for many of the tracks here. You may want to create a dummy version of the project that has all of the required tracks made, with some beginning clips included. A “starter kit” like this can help students who are struggling to feel engaged and successful.

8.9.10. During Work Time Be careful not to do too many steps in one session. You can avoid student fatigue by rotating among track building, clip recording, creative duplication, and practicing the recording. This project has many steps, and you should be careful not to explain them in the form of overwhelming “info dumps.” Pace yourself, double-​check steps as you go, and build in some free play time during each session where the goal is to simply create a few variations on what students already have. This way, you can help the ones who are working slowly to catch up, and others will be able to get a more personal and polished result.

8.9.11. Assessment Strategies 8.9.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Drum grooves, with and without kicks • A drop with chords, lead, and 808 bass • Snare rolls • The birdie 8.9.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • There is a quiet part/​intro part with quieter/​gentler versions of the synths. • The finishing touches include muted groups before a drop, added sound FX, etc. • There is a distinctive “signature” sound, theme or narrative element to the project.

References DeliFB. (2016). How to Make a Future Bass Banger in 5 Minutes! [YouTube video]. youtube.com/​ watch?v=3RwMzEwLWZ4 Harding, C. (2016). How the pop-​drop became the sound of 2016. Billboard. billboard.com/​ articles/​columns/​pop/​7625628/​pop-​drop-​sound-​of-​2016-​chainsmokers-​justin-​bieber-​ switched-​on-​pop Yenigun, S. (2011). Moombahton: Born in D.C., bred worldwide. National Public Radio: The Record. npr.org/​sections/​therecord/​2011/​03/​19/​134661427/​moombahton-​born-​ in-​d-​c-​bred-​worldwide

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8.10. Project Example: House Music 8.10.1. Project Duration Six to seven sessions.

8.10.2. Technical Goals

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• Students will gain proficiency creating clips using Push drum machine and Session modes (or equivalent tools). • Students will be introduced to bass and melodic sequencing. • Students will become familiar with quantization. • (optional) Students will get an introduction to MIDI.

8.10.3. Creative Goals • Students will gain confidence writing simple formulaic drum and bass patterns. • Students will develop a musical journey with an introduction, development, and climax. • Students will gain independence from prerecorded clips and write a 100% original composition.

8.10.4. Listening Examples • Royal House, “Can You Party” (1988) • Frankie Knuckles, “The Whistle Song” (1991) • Robin S, “Show Me Love” (1993) • Reel 2 Real, “Jazz It Up” [Erick Morillo Project Mix] (1996) • Daft Punk, “Revolution 909” (1997) • Darude, “Sandstorm” (2000) • Benassi Bros, “I Feel So Fine” [feat. Sandy] (2005) • Deadmau5, “Ghosts n Stuff” (2009) • Swedish House Mafia, “One” (2010)

8.10.5. Before Teaching This Lesson We recommend using a template session that includes some instruments and effects for this project. If you are not using Live to create this project, consider creating your own template file that includes a variety of bass sounds and a drum kit styled after the Roland TR-​909.

8.10.6. Project Design This project is designed to introduce students to a ubiquitous style of electronic music while guiding them through a prescriptive lesson that ensures a successful project at all levels. The first half of the project is a straight tutorial, allowing students to deviate only slightly from the step-​by-​step instructions. The second half allows students to customize their projects with sound effects and vocal samples of their choice, and to work in a self-​ directed way to create an ending.

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As in the future bass project (Chapter 8.9), the key is to get students at all ability levels past the first half of the project. If they are able to produce a variety of authentic-​ sounding house drum patterns and at least a couple of original basslines, then the rest of the process should go smoothly. Also like the future bass project, this project requires students to create melodies and harmonies via MIDI, on a standard controller or via the Push. Whether they are experienced musicians or not, students find the Push takes some getting used to, so don’t be afraid to take extra time going over how the pads are laid out. The project design intentionally limits students’ choices to scaffold a successful outcome. For example, at the outset, their drum parts will all be identical. They can personalize their drum parts later, but personalization is not necessary in order for the finished song to sound right. The basslines created on the second day are simple, using only a few notes. Depending on their musical skill, students can branch out and include more notes. The most important concept is getting the pitch range correct for a bass instrument (typically the bottom row of the Push keyboard mode, the MIDI notes C0 through C1). The process of creating several iterations of a bassline is valuable practice for more advanced projects later. The instruments in our template session are meant to replicate familiar sounds from house music, and they make a nice functional tie-​in to the history lesson. While the supplementary instruments included are suggestions, we strongly recommend using the Ducker device, which mimics the effect of a sidechain compressor paired with a strong four-​on-​the-​floor kick drum. Students can either apply the device to all synth tracks individually, or you can teach them about track groups and then apply Ducker to the group as a whole. The form for this song is highly variable, and you can structure it in any way that suits you. Will typically leads his students through an extended freeform intro that explores many of their original loops before having them scene-​trigger the buildup, voice shout, and drop sections, in that order. After triggering the drop scene, students will need to creatively wind down the track to an elegant ending. This gives the suggestion of an A-​ B-​A form. If you would rather structure the project around strict eight-​or sixteen-​bar phrases, or some other form, that can work too. The finished track should be one and a half to two minutes long, but can theoretically go much longer if desired.

8.10.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 8.10.7.1. Session 1: Introduction House music originated in disco. More specifically, house descends from extended mixes created for club DJs that included long rhythm section breaks. The innovation of house music was to strip away everything except the breaks, and then to build a new style of music on top of them. (Hip-​hop followed a similar trajectory.) Sonically, house producers drew inspiration from electronic pop groups like Depeche Mode and Soft Cell, and from Italian disco artists like Giorgio Moroder. The term “house music” was originally a reference to The Warehouse, a club in Chicago. Other crucial early house venues included New York’s Paradise Garage and the loft parties

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thrown by impresario David Mancuso. House DJs like Frankie Knuckles and Larry Levan started playing disco records on top of their own drum machine beats and then moved on from there to producing their own tracks using synthesizers and samplers. While house music is commercially ubiquitous now, it is important to point out that in its first decades, it was perceived as being a Black and gay music, and was scorned by white and straight audiences. The main unifying feature of house music is the four-​on-​the-​floor kick drum pattern, one on every quarter note. There will also usually be snares or claps on beats two and four, with hi-​hats or other high-​pitched percussion playing on the off-​beats. Other instrumentation varies, ranging from sampled acoustic instruments to synthesizers, usually playing syncopated rhythms. There will often be sixteenth-​note swing as well. Early house music drew on the tropes of funk, soul, jazz, gospel, and Latin dance music, but the sonic palette has expanded over time to include many other textures and timbres as well. House tracks usually have a tempo of 120 to 130 BPM—​a bit faster than disco, but not as fast as other electronic dance styles.

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8.10.7.2. Session 2: Drum Patterns Once you have given an overview of house music and its various styles, start by making some basic drum patterns. Begin by loading a typical house drum kit, modeled after the Roland TR-​909 drum machine. Every DAW will have such a kit, named “909” or “dance kit” or the like. On Push, use the Add Track button. Select Drum Rack, Core Library, Kit-​ Core 909. Most DAWs default to a tempo of 120 BPM, which is fine for house. You can bump it up to 125 or 130 BPM if you like. Place kicks on all of the quarter notes to create the four-​on-​the-​floor pattern (Figure 8.34). (On Push, select the kick pad, and place kicks in columns one and five.) Place snares on the backbeats, beats two and four. (On Push, put snares in column five.) Finally, place closed hi-​hats on each off-​beat (on Push, columns three and seven). Have students create a few variations of this pattern. At this point, show the students how to recall each stage of the drum pattern creation process using the arrow keys on Push. Right now, there is only one track in use, so you can use the Up and Down arrows to change clips. Do this while clips are playing for maximum clarity, and also be sure to draw students’ attention to the corresponding behavior on the computer screen. 8.10.7.3. Sessions 2 to 3: Basslines and Synths Next, you will create your bassline. We recommend that you use as few notes as possible, so you can devote all of your attention to rhythm. In dance music, melodic parts are essentially just pitched percussion, so encourage students to “drum” along with the beat to

Figure 8.34 A four-​on-​the-​floor kick drum pattern. This is the most important musical element of a house track.

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Figure 8.35

generate patterns. They can enter notes by drawing into the piano roll, or by playing live with a MIDI controller. On Push, press the Record button to create a Fixed Length loop that is two measures long by default. Unlike in drum sequencing, the only visual cue will be pads lighting up when a note plays. However they enter their notes, encourage students to play something slightly “faster” (more frequent) than the kick drum, which will usually result in a syncopated pattern (Figure 8.35). Be sure that Record Quantization is turned on, or have students quantize everything to the closest sixteenth note after recording. Students should get comfortable making several two-​bar patterns this way—​on Push, press the New button after each one. Allow plenty of time for students to browse and audition bass sounds. On Push, make sure the Preview button light is on (skinny button, far right). As for note choices, we recommend using the A natural minor scale, the white keys on the piano from A to A. This scale is easy to play, and minor tonality sounds idiomatic in house music. On Push, use Scales mode and select Minor. On the Push, students can listen back to their bass clips using the D-​Pad: • Press the Up or Down arrow to change bass clips. • Press Left to go back to the Drum Rack track, then press Up/​Down to change drum clips. • Constantly watch on-​screen behavior to see how clips are being triggered. If you like, have students directly click the clip triggers on screen to imitate the behavior of the Push. Many students will prefer Push, but they will want to learn on-​screen methods as well for at-​home use. Once the bass parts are in place, create a new track for chords. Use a piano, electric piano, organ, or a synth with a similar sound. Any combination of the white keys will work, but triads will sound best—​have students play every other white key in groups of three. On Push, they can use “chord triangles” following a simple formula: • Start on root position. Make a triangle with your fingers, with the blue pad (the tonic) on the left of the triangle. • Moving one pad up, diagonal-​up-​left, and diagonal-​up-​right is “legal.” • Moving one pad down, diagonal-​down-​left, and diagonal-​down-​right is “legal.” • If you are in major, moving one pad to the right is “legal.” • If you are in minor, moving one pad to the left is “legal.” If students don’t know what to play, they can start by playing the root triad position and stabbing at it randomly (Figure 8.36). Make sure to have Record Quantization and Fixed Length turned on, so that clips play in time and sound musical. Do spot checks to make sure that students are recording loops that are two, four, or eight bars long, rather than very short or very long clips.

A bass line mostly made from a single note, with a few neighboring notes to add a bit of interest. Dance music often defines its tonality by centering on a single drone-​like note.

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Figure 8.36 A chord-​based clip, with additional melodic notes on top. House music producers commonly layer tracks by combining slowly moving block chords with a monotone but rhythmic bass line.

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Figure 8.37 These are all the same MIDI clip, layered over two instruments, edited only by shifting octaves and moving start points.

8.10.7.4. Sessions 4 to 5: Layering, Midi, and Presets Now that you’ve built the foundation of the house (as it were), it’s time to build further. Students who have trouble coming up with ideas via MIDI can duplicate their existing clips onto new tracks with different instruments (Figure 8.37). In the template session, we have included some idiomatic instruments for you to use: • Hypersaw: A stack of detuned sawtooth waves, perfect for higher-​pitched synth parts (included in most DAW’s) • Hoover: An even more aggressively detuned synth with a less stable pitch (can be used for bass) • Liquid Bass: A high-​passed bass synth with a movable filter cutoff frequency • Ducker: An audio effect used to simulate sidechain compression, making the synths duck down on each beat Continue arranging/​triggering clips and deciding which ones work well together. This is the stage where students can do the most customization, so leave plenty of time and give students individual attention if they need it.

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Figure 8.38 Buildup drum pattern. Place the MIDI clip on the existing drum track for an accelerating pattern that can accompany riser sound effects.

8.10.7.5. Sessions 5 to 6: Buildup, Voice Shout, and Drop At this point, your class will add some prescribed form elements to avoid monotony and to provide an anchor for the rest of the music. About two thirds of the way through the arrangement, have students add an eight-​bar snare roll-​type buildup, a voice sample, and a drop section. This will force even the most basic projects to have some structural interest, and it will make it easy for students to customize their tracks in a fun way. The buildup (Vox, 2019) is a standard dance music trope: an eight-​bar pattern where kick, snare, and cymbal play four whole notes, then four half notes, then four quarter notes, and so on, creating the effect of acceleration (Figure 8.38). You can distribute premade MIDI file for the buildup to save time and frustration. If you prefer to have students create the buildup clip manually, we recommend doing it on the computer rather than on Push, because longer clips are easier to work with on the screen. Place the buildup clip on the drum track. For visual clarity on the Push, place the buildup scene on the bottom edge of the guide box (scene 8). Copy one or two of your higher-​pitched synths into the same scene as the buildup. This will help to transition between the first part of the song and the buildup section, and will create continuity. Consider also dragging in a sound effect of a white noise sweep or similar riser/​uplifter effect onto the audio track in the buildup scene. You can obtain sound effects easily from the web (e.g., from freesound.org). You can also curate a collection of such effects in advance. The buildup clip lasts for eight measures, so make sure the noise effect has the right length. If the clip is too short, you can elongate it—​in Live, use the *2 button in the clip controls. Between the buildup and the drop (discussed below), you can add a brief section called the voice shout. This can be any short speech sample: a quote from a movie or TV show, a recording of text-​to-​speech “robot voice,” or anything else you can think of. Next comes the drop, the energetic peak of the song. It is named for its psychological effect. Dancers use the kick drum to establish their sense of pulse. If you remove the kick and other low-​frequency sounds, dancers will feel suspense and uncertainty (Zeiner-​ Henriksen, 2016, p. 121). When the kick and bass return suddenly, it feels like being dropped back to the ground. If the buildup is mostly treble-​heavy sounds, then the drop should be made of bass-​heavy sounds. Duplicate a bass clip from earlier in the project and replace the instrument with an aggressive-​sounding bass. Copy the first drum clip (the one with only kick drum) and paste it in the same scene. Finally, add a Ducker to the new bass track.

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Figure 8.39 House music project assembled in Session View, ready to record. Note the three structural scenes toward the bottom—​Buildup, Voice Shout, Drop. Each student should have these scenes to provide structure and common checkpoints during project work.

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There is now a sequence of musical events that you can lay out on the timeline or step through using the scene triggers on the right side of Live Session View: first, the buildup, then the voice shout, then the drop (Figure 8.39). Now the song is ready to be played back as a complete track. 8.10.7.6. Session 7: Creating the Arrangement and Finishing the Track In this session, you will do the final organizing of clips and loops into a finished song. You can do this manually on the timeline or perform the track in Live Session View and record into Arrangement View. If you have been making the track along with the students, give them a performance of your Session View improvisation. In Session Mode, the Push grid mirrors the layout of clips on the screen. To switch to Session Mode on Push, press the Session button on the bottom right above the Up/​ Down/​Left/​Right arrows. To get back to Note mode, press the Note button. Whenever students use Session Mode, encourage them to also change the view mode of the top panel to Mix, and the view mode of the skinny buttons to Stop. Be sure to point out that these three panels operate independently of each other. Changing the top screen to Mix allows students to read track names and adjust the mix as they perform the song, and showing Stop buttons allows a quick way to stop the track if there are no empty clip slots. “Session, Mix, Stop” is an oft-​repeated mantra in Will’s class. Students should be able to trigger their introductory material one clip at a time. This section can evolve naturally as they cycle through their clips. After a minute or so, they can trigger the buildup/​voice/​drop sequence. The overall form of the song should start and end simply, with the buildup/​drop coming near the middle of the track. After practicing triggering their song a few times, they can record it to Arrangement View. After recording to Arrangement View, students will need to activate the arrangement by pressing the orange button to the right of the timeline. There is not much to do in Arrangement View in this project, but you can fix errors, add more transition sound effects, or make fine edits and chops to the voice part (Figure 8.40).

8.10.8.  Troubleshooting 8.10.8.1. My Bassline Sounds Stupid Usually this means the student recorded their part an octave or two too high. You can help them transpose their parts. In Live, double-​click the MIDI clip, deselect all notes, and type “-​12” in the box that shows the note range. This will lower all notes by an octave. Try to use material that students already recorded, rather than asking them to record again—​while generating parts is easy for trained musicians, it can feel like a major undertaking to a novice or nontraditional musician.

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Figure 8.40 Finished house music project, recorded to Arrangement View.

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8.10.8.2. My Parts Don’t Sound as Good as Yours This could have several causes, but for Push users, it usually means that either the scale is still set to Major, Record Quantization is off, or Fixed Length has been turned off. Look at the clip and try to find differences between your example and theirs. Do you see a strange measure length? This is a Fixed Length issue. Do you hear a root chord in major? Correct the clip in question manually and then set the scale correctly on Push.

8.10.9. Differentiated Instruction This project balances a few mandatory structure elements with a fair amount of customization around them. Every project will start and end differently, but somewhere in the middle will be the dramatic buildup followed by the voice shout and the drop. Advanced students will want to spend extra time customizing the voice part, possibly having “stutter edits” to continue over the rest of their track. These students will do most of their extending of the project in the final stage, in the timeline/​Arrangement View. If students have completed the requirements early, they can perform detailed editing and heighten the interest of their creative introduction and ending. If students are struggling with parts, resist the temptation to allow them to use the stock loop library. That would defeat the purpose of the project! Instead, have them students focus on a simplified process of recording material. On Push, “blue pads” and “stab the triangle” should be the mantras for writing new parts. On the piano keyboard, stick to a few white-​key triads. Encourage simplicity—​if the parts are too busy, they will sound chaotic and unmusical. Make sure that students have the required structure elements (buildup, voice, drop) and that their drop scene is simplistic, using only the kick drum and one bass part. This way, no matter how idiosyncratic their intro might be, the rest of the track will have the same flow as other projects.

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8.10.10. During Work Time

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Spot check students during drum programming to make sure that the main kick and snare parts are correct. Be available during the bass phase. Students will have questions about how to change their mind regarding instrument choice. Allow plenty of time for students to generate original clips and encourage experimentation. Emphasize that there will be time to narrow down their ideas later, and that not every idea needs to make it into the finished product. Many students are still getting over their “piano phobia,” so be patient. During the recording/​planning time, move around between stations and chat with students about their projects, even if they don’t explicitly ask for help. Many of them will reveal an opinion or an idea about their project, and it helps them to see how you would handle the situation.

8.10.11. Assessment Strategies 8.10.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Tempo is between 120 and 130 BPM (or there is a good reason for it not to be). • Four-​on-​the-​floor kick drum is present and audible. • A variety of bass and higher-​pitched synth clips are present. 8.10.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Volume levels are set thoughtfully, especially during the buildup/​drop phase. • The song has a musical journey, demonstrating that thought and practice went into the pre-​buildup portion of the song especially, both in clip content and sequence.

References Garcia, L.-​M. (2005). On and on: Repetition as process and pleasure in electronic dance music. Music Theory Online, 11(4). Vox. (2019). The ingredients of a classic house track [YouTube video]. youtube.com/​ watch?v=FrqIA0PpAv8 Zeiner-​Henriksen, H. T. (2016). Moved by the groove: Bass drum sounds and body movements in electronic dance music. In A. Danielsen (Ed.), Musical rhythm in the age of digital reproduction (pp. 121–​139). Routledge.

8.11. Project Example: Trap Beats 8.11.1. Project Duration Five to seven sessions.

8.11.2. Technical Goals • Students will gain deeper familiarity with drum programming. • Students will become familiar with Push screen modes and track-​switching buttons. • Students will mix low-​frequency content by applying saturation and EQ.

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8.11.3. Creative Goals • Students will create fast and slow patterns using Note Repeat on Push. • Students will enhance tracks by creating variations and effect chains. • Students will practice performing their beats into Session Mode as a compositional technique.

8.11.4. Listening Examples Warning: Trap songs are usually full of explicit and inappropriate language. Your safest bet is to use instrumental versions of these songs only. • Cardi B, “Bodak Yellow” (2017) • Lil Pump, “Gucci Gang” (2017) • Migos, “Bad and Boujee” [feat. Lil Uzi Vert] (2017) • Travis Scott, “SICKO MODE” [feat. Drake] (2018) • BHAD BHABIE, “Gucci Flip Flops” [feat. Lil Yachty] (2018) • Drake, “I’m Upset” (2018)

8.11.5. Before Teaching This Lesson Trap evolves fast. The listening examples given above are popular as of this writing, but you should poll your students to find some more current references. While other styles of hip-​hop use sampled breakbeats, trap drums and bass are almost always programmed from scratch using MIDI. There may still be samples used for keyboard or guitar parts or for atmosphere, but the foundation will be programmed. You should familiarize yourself with the various note modes on Push, specifically the Repeat function. You can also preload Live with a template set that serves the needs of many MIDI-​based projects. Instead of opening Live and getting the standard set of two empty MIDI tracks and two empty audio tracks, create a default set with three tracks: a synth, a drum kit, and an 808 bass. Will likes to make the templates on each station load with the same 808 bass, but with different default synths and drum kits otherwise. Preparing default sessions this way enables students to jump straight into beatmaking without any setup time. While we were writing this, “Old Town Road” by Lil Nas X (2019) broke the record for the longest run at Number 1 on the Billboard Top 100. Its vocal aspect sounds like country, but its beat is unmistakably trap. Jesse McCarthy (2018) wrote that trap “is the only music that sounds like what living in contemporary America feels like” (para. 8). We love trap as music, but we are middle-​aged white dads, and we find the lyrics problematic to say the least. Lyric writing is beyond the scope of this book, but some of your students are probably aspiring songwriters and emcees, and all of them have thoughts and feelings about the words to songs. While you probably will not want to play trap lyrics in class, students will certainly have heard them. We think it’s worth talking them through. It’s also important to recognize that the commercial mainstream is not the only kind of trap that exists. Like all musical styles, trap is a container that can be filled with any kind of content. Evan Tobias (2014) suggested that we “flip the misogynist script,” and use the compelling musical vocabulary of trap for different expressive purposes. Ethan

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worked with a group of eighth graders to produce some deeply affecting trap songs they had written about their families’ struggles with poverty and foster care.

8.11.6. Project Design Students should start by listening to examples of trap beats and identifying and listing their common tropes. Some features you can listen for:

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• Ambiguous tempo (Trap’s base tempo is usually very slow—​65 to 70 BPM—​but it seems “fast” because of the double-​time feel) • Complex, rolling hi-​hat patterns resembling marching-​band snare rolls • Backbeats accented by claps rather than snares • Other snares, pitched up and down, on offbeats • Kick drum playing a syncopated pattern like tresillo • 808 bass largely matched to the kick drum (Trap producers often forgo bass entirely and simply tune the kick drums to play the bassline) • Simple melodic parts in natural minor or Phrygian mode

8.11.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 8.11.7.1. Session 1: Intro and Groove Pizza After using the listening examples to identify common musical elements in trap, you can use the Groove Pizza to visualize and recreate some beats. Trap beats have the same basic syncopated backbeat skeleton as older hip-​hop styles, but the pulse is thirty-​second notes rather than sixteenth notes. Because most drum programming interfaces default to sixteenths, trap producers double their session tempo to work in half-​time. In other words, to create a trap beat at the conventional tempo of 65 to 70 BPM, you should set your session tempo to be 130 to 140 BPM. This means that drum patterns will need to be twice as many measures long as usual, and that the backbeats will fall on beat three of each measure, not on beats two and four. Take a look at the Groove Pizza preset, “It’s A Trap” (Figure 8.41). The sixteen slices in each pizza represent half a measure of 4/​4 time in thirty-​second notes, with the snare at six o’clock, rather than at three and nine o’clock (Hein, 2017). Students will get very confused if you talk about sixteenth and thirty-​second notes, but comparing this pattern visually and aurally to a sixteenth-​note-​based boom-​bap pattern should help get the point across. 8.11.7.2. Session 2: Drum Programming You can export Groove Pizza patterns as MIDI, or start from scratch and make beats using a more traditional drum machine method. Start by making a two-​bar clip with basic backbeats and a half-​time feel. • Create a new drum track using an 808 drum kit—​Live’s preset is called 808 Core Kit. • Set the tempo to 130 to 140 BPM. • Place a clap on beat three of both measures—​on Push, the first pad in row two and row four.

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Figure 8.41 “It’s a Trap” [Groove Pizza preset].

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Now add the kick drum, using a tresillo pattern. • Place a kick on the first, fourth, and seventh eighth notes in the pattern—​on Push, the first and seventh pad in the top row, and the fifth pad in the second row. • Toward the end of the two-​bar loop, place a few sixteenth notes right next to each other on the kick drum. It also sounds good to have three kicks in a row on the last beat of the last measure. To make a rolling hi-​hat pattern without doing a lot of tedious mouse clicking, use a controller with Note Repeat function. On the Push: • Press Repeat in the lower right. • Hold down the Hi-​Hat pad with your left hand. • Using your right hand, change the note value using the black buttons along the right side of the pads. Try keeping your thumb on 1/​8th and using your index finger to change to smaller note values briefly, all while holding down the Hi-​Hat pad with your left hand. • Once you have a pattern that you like, press Record and perform it to add it to the clip.

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After doing the basic procedure of making a drum groove with students, allow them to make several variations with their own combinations of ideas. Some standard tropes include: • Clips using just hi-​hat and clap • Clips with backup snares that mimic the kick drum tresillo pattern • Clips with just clap and kick • Clips with only one clap sound and a more minimal hi-​hat

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And so on. During this time, switch between individual troubleshooting and spot checking. Ask students what kind of beat they are trying to make, and then demonstrate how you might make that beat, so everyone can see your thought process. 8.11.7.3. Session 3: 808 Bass Remember that trap basslines are usually played on tuned 808 kick drums. Live has a preset 808 sound that will work well for this purpose called Sub808Bass. You can also load a sampler with a clearly pitched 808 sample. You will not want to use the major scale. Natural minor scale or Phrygian mode work better. You can play them on the white keys of the piano, thinking of A as the root for natural minor, or E as the root for Phrygian. You can also use the Scale device, or use the Scales mode on Push. You can play your 808 bass parts via MIDI, draw them into the piano roll, or use the Push step sequencer mode. Press Layout twice to change the pad view to Melodic Sequencer + 32 Notes and place 808s as if you were programming drums. This makes the bottom half of the pads into playable notes, while the top half functions as a sequencer. Play the lowest note (the pad in the lower right corner). Mimic the tresillo pattern from the kick drum. Feel free to change notes for the other two notes in the pattern. Try adding one bass note that is higher than the rest for contrast. This new bass part can be difficult to hear on headphones, especially cheap ones. If you add a distortion effect like Drum Buss or Saturator, it will boost the 808’s upper overtones and bring the bass sound out more in the mix. 8.11.7.4. Melodic Elements To add some contrast to your rhythmically active beat, you can now add some slower melodic elements. These should be quantized. You can perform them first and quantize afterward, or use the approach you took with the hi-​hats and play them live using the Repeat function. • Add a new synth track. Pick one that is washy and echo-​y; the Ambient & Evolving category is a great place to start choosing ideas. • Load the new instrument. • Press Repeat and change the note value to 1/​4. • Record a short two-​bar pattern with no more than four notes in it. Keep this simple, and leave space between the notes. As you did with the drumbeats, allow students to create several clips with this instrument. To keep the arrangement simple, you will be copying some of these clips onto other

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Figure 8.42

tracks later. Allow plenty of time for students to come up with melodic ideas and to explore other synth sounds they might like better. 8.11.7.5. Session 4: Duplicating Clips As in the slow jam, future bass, and house music projects (Chapters 8.8, 8.9, and 8.10), you will reuse your melodic clips on some louder-​sounding instruments, either to double and reinforce the parts you have or for sonic variety. Give the students some time to add variety in their sounds and to do some mixing. 8.11.7.6. Intro Scene, Drop Scene Now that you have some material to work with, give your song a structure. We recommend organizing your ideas into two scenes/​sections. The first scene, the one you started with, will be the drop. It should include the 808 bass and the most complicated drumbeats. This section is where the “beat drops” in a standard hip-​hop track. The other scene/​section will be the intro, although you can also mix it back in throughout the song as well. This section’s main feature is that it has no bass and no kick drum. If you like, you can replace the kick with a pitched snare drum part, or you can high-​pass filter the kick itself. The goal is to create sonic contrast with the beat drop. Use the same melodic material for this scene as you did in the drop, but play the clips on lighter, less intense instruments (Figure 8.42). 8.11.7.7. Session 5: Adding Sound Effects and Recording By now, your track will sound recognizably like trap, but to really make it effective, you’ll need to add some detail. You can personalize the sound with single events and one-​shot samples: an air horn, a siren, a sampled chant, etc. Try placing several sound effects on a Drum Rack device so you can easily access and experiment with them (Figure 8.43). Once students have figured out how to gracefully transition between the two scenes, it’s time for them to lay out their song structure on the timeline, or to record it from Session View (Figure 8.44). There is less postproduction necessary in this project, but students may want to create smoother transitions between sections, more detail in their parts, and a few singular events like sound effects.

8.11.8.  Troubleshooting Students often have trouble hearing the 808 bass on headphones or small speakers. Encourage them to trust their meters and to add more saturation to exaggerate the overtones.

Drop and Intro scenes, along with unused material. The Drop scene includes the 808 bass and heavier instruments. The Intro scene is intentionally lighter and leaves the bass frequencies empty. The LexLugerFX clip is used to transition from the Intro to Drop scene.

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Figure 8.43 Several Chant sound effects placed in a Drum Rack device for easier recall and sequencing.

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Figure 8.44 Completed track, recorded in eight-​bar segments, alternating between intro and drop sections.

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It takes some skill to do a graceful transition in Session View between the intro and drop. Help students pull it off by making sure their ideas are organized into rows/​ scenes. One-​shot sound effects should be placed away from the main two scenes so you can locate them easily, whether you are triggering them by mouse or with a MIDI controller. Most students will succeed at the technical aspects of this project, but the results can have a “cookie cutter” quality. Help them imagine out-​of-​the-​box ideas by showing examples that involve sampling, alternative tempos, and interesting transitions.

8.11.9. Differentiated Instruction Students struggling with the basics of drum programming will enjoy this project, as it gives them ample time to practice writing sequences and loops. These students should focus more on the drum and bass patterns and less on the additional sound effects. If they leave this project with a better mastery of writing original loops, consider it an unqualified success, whether they end up with a personalized project or not. Advanced students will find it interesting to create minimal melodies that don’t sound too busy for the genre. Encourage these students to focus on overall sound quality and sound design. Ethan was told by a producer named Brandon Bennett to think of the layers of a trap beat as “the sky and the earth.” Students can create a grander and more spacious sound by doubling parts, adding reverb or delay, creating dropouts, and adding unexpected samples. One student of Will’s took the project far out of the box with an extended gospel choir intro, and then converted the choir to a MIDI harmony part.

8.11.10. During Work Time You can think of this project as a reintroduction to drum programming. For this reason, it is important to check students’ drum programming technique regularly, especially when the initial “everything” beat is being made. Beyond making sure that students use good technique for their drums and 808s, you should use a lighter touch with this project. Students should explore their own tastes and try to create something new within the constraints of the genre. Encourage them to try to rework something they liked from an actual song. Consider splitting up the listening examples into a daily exercise where you pick a beat and reverse-​engineer it. This is a great chance to hone your on-​the-​fly beatmaking skills before a receptive audience.

8.11.11. Assessment Strategies 8.11.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Drum beats are made in correct tempo with rolling hi-​hats. • Kick drum drops out during intro sections. • 808 bass sounds are audible but not overpowering when played on speakers. • Melodic MIDI parts are shared among a few different instruments that appear in different sections of the song.

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8.11.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Sound effects and one-​shots are mixed tastefully and add to the “sound world” of the song. • Transitions between intro and drop sections are smooth and show the student’s understanding of pacing. • Students make the narrowly defined genre their own by adding elements not described here.

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References Hein, E. (2017). Visualizing trap beats with the Groove Pizza. ethanhein.com/​wp/​2016/​ visualizing-​trap-​beats-​with-​the-​groove-​pizza/​ McCarthy, J. (2018, Fall). Notes on trap. n+1. nplusonemag.com/​issue-​32/​essays/​ notes-​on-​trap/​ Tobias, E. (2014). Flipping the misogynist script: Gender, agency, hip hop and music education. Action, Criticism, and Theory for Music Education, 13(2), 48–​83.

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9.1. Designing Projects to Teach Originality Musical originality is not easy to teach, but it can be done. Like any other skill, creative thinking can be honed through practice. Unlike most other skills, however, creative practice does not always need to be regimented. The teacher should aim to create a space where students can express original ideas with maximum safety and acceptance. As the students get used to sharing their thoughts and feelings through music, they will build confidence, and the teacher can help them to sharpen their artistic communication skills. Oscar Odena (2012, p. 513) described two types of creativity, the “traditional” and the “new.” The traditional concept is the one we use in ordinary language, when we talk about the creativity of “real artists,” professional composers or painters or sculptors. By contrast, the new concept refers to a psychological state of imaginative thinking. Anyone can be in this state, which manifests in actions rather than specific products. The new concept of creativity is the one that applies to the way small children build with blocks or talk to their stuffed animals. In this line of thinking, creativity is a combination of personality, ability, and motivation. In music tech, the teacher’s job is to encourage the personality aspects of creativity, to supply the building blocks of ability, and, most importantly, to support students’ motivation. When you think of being creative, do you think of a romantically messy and irrational journey, fueled by bolts of inspiration? Or do you think of a more systematic, patient, and disciplined craft? We believe that creative work must be a combination of the two. School is systematic by nature, and it requires that we deliver technical knowledge whose learning can be measured (Stålhammar, 2003, p. 63). Teachers have to grade student projects, but how can they grade creativity? (We discuss this problem in depth in Chapter 11.) There have been some attempts to assess creativity quantitatively, like the (super fun-​sounding) Creative Product Analysis Matrix proposed by Susan Besemer and Karen O’Quin (1999). Imagine having a piece of your art assessed this way. The demands of grading are not always compatible with a playfully creative atmosphere.

Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0009

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For students, showing one another their process can be a far more valuable learning experience than the end product (Order et al., 2017). Making art can be structured only up to a point. “Creativity is essentially a messy process involving the generation of much redundant material, ideas, and cul-​de-​sacs that seemed so promising at the time before a final path presents itself” (Adkins, 2016, p. 197). We need to welcome moments of inspiration when they come and to let students chase them where they may lead. It’s a balancing act. Everyone has emotions, but few people have ever expressed them through sound. Even accomplished musicians may not have tried doing it before. We use the Soundscape project as a first foray into this kind of emotional thinking. The project has few rules, by design. In a sense, the project is too easy. Students could technically complete it by turning in a minute of random noise. The guidelines seem so vague that there must be a catch, and indeed there is one. The catch is that students have to be honest with themselves about whether their music creates the right feeling. When we ask students to internally judge whether their work hits the right emotional beats, we are asking them to practice expressive authenticity. Young people don’t usually do this at school, and we know that it asks a lot of them. However, making art demands internal honesty, especially for students who will be leading their own activities, so it’s a quality we need to cultivate.

References Adkins, M. (2016). Using experience design in curricula to enhance creativity and collaborative practice in electronic music. In A. King & E. Himonides (Eds.), Music, technology, and education: Critical perspectives (pp. 191–​209). Routledge. Besemer, S., & O’Quin, K. (1999). Confirming the three-​factor Creative Process Analysis Matrix model in an American sample. Creativity Research Journal, 12(4), 287–​296. Odena, O. (2012). Creativity in the secondary music classroom. In G. McPherson & G. Welch (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of music education, Volume 1 (pp. 512–​528). Oxford University Press. Order, S., Murray, L., Prince, J., Hobson, J., & de Freitas, S. (2017). Remixing creativity in learning and learning of creativity: A case study of audio remix practice with undergraduate students. Asia Pacific Media Educator, 27(2), 298–​310. Stålhammar, B. (2003). Music teaching and young people’s own musical experience. Music Education Research, 5(1), 61–​68.

9.2.  Irreverence School is a serious place, and the music classroom is no exception. We take music seriously—​but we try not to take ourselves too seriously. If you are willing to self-​critique and show a sense of humor, it will go a long way toward building rapport with your students and will encourage them to open up. Projects like Video Beatboxing demand technical precision and skill, but they are also playful and ideally won’t feel like schoolwork at all. We learned a lot of what we know about culture and history from reading MAD magazine, and we hope that the more outside-​the-​box projects can bring that same kind of energy into your classroom.

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9.3. Repurposing Ideas That Exist Already The audio projects in the previous chapters use recorded and prerecorded material, while the MIDI projects use material created from scratch. The outside-​the-​box projects are more about creative repurposing: starting with something and twisting it beyond recognition. In the Sampling project, students create original ideas by transforming other people’s music. They choose samples according to their own musical taste and experience, extract small pieces, and reassemble them into an original beat. Sampling turns recorded music into a participatory medium, a two-​way conversation rather than one-​way consumption (Oliver, 2016). It’s wonderfully empowering to be able to virtually collaborate with your musical idols, and to re-​sequence the DNA of well-​known songs. The history of music technology is full of people who “misapplied” tools and techniques. Rock, hip-​hop, and techno exist only because artists and engineers used technology the “wrong way.” It’s no accident that so many innovators of American music are Black. Rayvon Fouché (2006) pointed out that African Americans have been long exploited by technology, but they have also found “expressions of Black vernacular technological creativity” (p. 640). This creativity has taken three main forms: redeployment, reconception, and re-​creation. • Musicians redeploy technology by finding new uses for it without altering its physical form, as when dub producers remixed multitrack tapes of reggae bands into psychedelic new forms. • Musicians reconceive technology when they transgress against its intended function and conventional meaning, as when Jimi Hendrix used feedback to make the guitar amp an expressive instrument unto itself. • Musicians re-​create technology when they redesign and produce new tools after rejecting existing tools, as when hip-​hop DJs developed turntables and mixers that met their new expressive demands. The digital tools we use today are also products of vernacular technological creativity, Black and otherwise.

References Fouché, R. (2006). Say It Loud, I’m Black and I’m Proud: African Americans, American artifactual culture, and Black vernacular technological creativity. American Quarterly, 58(3), 639–​661. Oliver, R. (2016). Bring that beat back: Sampling as virtual collaboration. In S. Whiteley & S. Rambarran (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of music and virtuality. Oxford University Press.

9.4. Finding Your Voice The ultimate goal of the projects in this book is to foster the growth of young musicians with unique voices who are able to execute original ideas. In other words, we hope to empower the next generation of independent music professionals. (We discuss creative

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Figure 9.1 Three project-​building strategies intersect to form distinct experiences that help students develop their own unique voice.

AUDIO PROJECTS

Audio Tech Knowledge

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Practical Recording

UNIQUE VOICE

MIDI PROJECTS

Original Songwriting

CREATIVE DEVIATION

types in Chapter 14.) Figure 9.1 shows the three types of projects in this book: the audio and MIDI projects of previous chapters and the “creative deviation” projects that follow in this chapter. We hope that you, the teacher, adapt the creative deviation methods to your own unique experiences and interests, and that they help you find your own voice through project design.

9.5. Project Example: Soundscape 9.5.1. Project Duration Three to four sessions.

9.5.2. Technical Goals • Students will explore audio effects. • Students will experiment and gain familiarity with device chains (such as Device View on Push). • Students will learn how to integrate a photo or video into their DAW.

9.5.3. Creative Goals • Students will find connections between sound combinations and emotional qualities. • Students will use a visual cue to inspire links between audio and vision. • Students will transform default instruments in interesting ways using audio effects.

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9.5.4. Listening Examples • Aphex Twin—Selected Ambient Works Volume II, Disc 1, Track 10, (“Tree”) (1994)1 • Future Sound of London—​“Ill Flower” (1994) • 2814, “恢复” (2015) • Oneohtrix Point Never, “Still Life” (2013)

9.5.5. Before Teaching This Lesson Experiment with all the audio effects available in your DAW, with two goals in mind: to be able to describe what the effect is doing exactly, and to identify which effects might be useful for lengthening a note. If you are using Push, get familiar with the workflow of adding a track and then adding multiple effects to it.

9.5.6. Project Design This project is an intentional departure from the step-​by-​step approach of the trap beats project (Chapter 8.11). In that project, students create an archetypical pop song structure. This project forgoes structure altogether except for a time constraint. While this project has a specific technical goal (to learn about audio effects), there is a creative goal as well: to create a mood with ambient sounds. All of the projects so far have asked the students to apply techniques and to color them with personal choices, but this project asks them go further in deciding how their sounds are making them feel. First, the project explores how much it is possible to transform a regular grand piano using audio effects. Next, students choose an image and create a one-​minute track that uses sound to make the listener “feel” like that image. There are few steps and they are technically undemanding; the challenge is to have students create several iterations of their sounds and judge their relation to the image.

9.5.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 9.5.7.1. Session 1: Drones, Choosing Pictures Start by having students add a new track to a blank project. They can choose whatever instrument they want, as long as it can sustain its notes indefinitely and is mellow rather than flashy or attention-​grabbing. A drone is simply defined as a long, unchanging sound. Students should create their own drone by recording or drawing a note that lasts for 60 seconds. (If you are using Push, stay in Arrangement View and use the on-​screen Arrangement Record button to accomplish this.) Note that some DAWs will not play MIDI notes if playback begins after the note onset. If you are wondering why your long notes are not playing in GarageBand, this is why. Ableton recently changed Live so that MIDI notes will sound if playback begins anywhere during their duration. Either way, eliminate headaches by bouncing the long note to audio, then import the audio version onto a new track.

1 Aphex Twin named the tracks on Selected Ambient Works Volume II with enigmatic images only; the verbal titles were given by fans. See Weidenbaum (2014) for more explanation.

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Figure 9.2 An empty beach.

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After finishing their drone, students will need to select an image or video for visual inspiration. They should choose a photo of a place without people, animals, or obvious motion. Drone videos of landscapes also work well for this purpose. The visual element should be devoid of obvious interpretation or cultural baggage. Figure 9.2 is a picture of a beach. It could be a happy place, maybe a vacation spot. Or maybe you don’t like beaches and the picture makes you think of being hot and sunburnt. Maybe your boat just crashed on a desert island and you have no hope for rescue. Whatever your interpretation, it exists in your head, rather than in the image itself. You can give it a completely different feel with a serene soundscape versus an edgy or tense one. Figure 9.3 is another picture of a beach, but this time with chairs and an umbrella. The chairs remove most of the ambiguity, suggesting a safe, relaxing place. Even without audio context, it’s more obvious what the picture is trying to say. A soundscape for this image will either conform to tropical/​relaxation tropes or feel mismatched and disjointed. Try to choose natural-​looking photographs that don’t look retouched or enhanced, and avoid locations that only have one possible purpose or association (sports stadiums, for example). After choosing the picture or video, save it to the computer. If you have Live Standard or Suite, you can import the visual media into an audio track and extend or cut its length to match the 60-​second drone length. 9.5.7.2. Session 2: Add Piano and Audio Effects The next step is to add a MIDI track with a grand piano. Students will choose a scale for their piano melody and audio effects to alter its timbre. There are several ways to make scales accessible to students who are not familiar or adept with them.

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Figure 9.3 A beach, but for vacationing.

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• The standard piano keyboard gives you several scales “for free”—​the white keys play the seven modes of C major, and the black keys play the G-​flat/​F-​sharp major pentatonic and E-​flat/​D-​sharp minor pentatonic scales. By setting the drone to the appropriate note and playing the white or black keys exclusively, students can effortlessly explore these nine scales. • Live’s Scale effect automatically maps notes played on a MIDI controller to any desired scale. You can play the white keys (or any other notes) and have it output whichever scale in whatever key you choose. There are dozens of presets to explore (Figure 9.4). • Push has a Scale mode that similarly maps the pads to many different possible scales (Figure 9.5). • The aQWERTYon (musedlab.org/​ aqwertyon), developed by New York University’s Music Experience Design Lab, makes it possible to play a wide variety of scales directly from the computer keyboard. This is especially helpful if you do not have MIDI controllers available. The scale menu is color-​coded to give an indication of how scales will sound. Green notes are major, sharp, or perfect intervals above the root, blue notes are minor, flat, or diminished intervals above the root, and purple notes are perfect or neutral intervals above the root. Scales with more green will be brighter or happier, and scales with more blue will be darker or sadder (Figure 9.6). That covers the technical aspect. But how should students choose scales for particular moods? Simple trial and error works, but it is time-​consuming. Ethan maintains a list of all the scales commonly used in Western music and their standard emotional associations (Hein, 2010). Some broad strokes: • Most students of high school age have been told something to the effect that “major is happy” and “minor is sad.” The other diatonic modes could be considered “shades of gray” between happy and sad: Lydian is more happy-​sounding, while Phrygian is more sad-​sounding.

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Figure 9.4 Live’s Scale effect with the Phrygian Dominant Scale preset.

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Figure 9.5 The Scale menu on Push.

• The pentatonic scales (both major and minor) are useful for portraying a more peaceful scene. This is why wind chimes are usually tuned to pentatonics. • For a less familiar sound (to Western ears), the East Asian scales located at the bottom of the Push Scale menu might be useful. Many are pentatonic scales as well, but with uneven intervals. Will likes to explain audio effects by comparing them to Instagram filters. When you apply a filter to a photo, it still looks like the original image, but with its mood or details altered. If you apply enough filters, or use extreme settings, however, the image will become unrecognizable. Audio effects work the same way.

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Figure 9.6 The aQWERTYon scale menu.

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Add a grand piano track (or use a similarly familiar instrument). Demonstrate some effects—​the less subtle, the better. Explain how an effect is like a pedal that a guitarist uses. Remember that in order to hear what the effect sounds like, you have to play some MIDI notes. We suggest that you begin with these: • Reverb—​makes the piano sound like it’s in a different spatial environment. • Delay (simple, ping pong, etc.)—​makes make the sound echo and repeat in various ways. (GarageBand calls this effect “echo.”) • Phaser/​Flanger—​makes psychedelic whooshing sounds, very science-​fictional. • Redux—​makes the piano sound like a 1980s video game. Have students experiment by adding various effects to the piano to alter the sound. Not all of the effects will be immediately obvious—​have the students fiddle with the parameters or choose something else. 9.5.7.3. Sessions 3 to 4: Add Four or Five More Tracks and Finish After the initial process of adding a tripped-​out piano track, allow plenty of time for students to explore other instrument sounds and effects and to use them to compose ideas over their drone and initial piano part. For each new track, students should: • Select an interesting instrument that triggers the emotional response they’re looking for, • Add at least one effect to the instrument, and • Improvise as many or as few notes as they wish over one pass of the video. Demonstrate examples that include slow or fast notes, played using various scales. There is no single “correct” answer. Some strategies might include: • Recording the same “riff” over and over, and then removing some sections as desired. • Recording multiple overlapping drones. • Filling the sonic spectrum from low to high pitch, or making the pitch band very narrow. • Making all note changes with pitch bend instead of changing keys

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Figure 9.7 A completed Soundscape project.

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• Automating hard mutes as an audio effect. Once students have four or five tracks that set the desired mood, they can export the project and turn it in (Figure 9.7).

9.5.8.  Troubleshooting Some students will mistake the bars-​and-​beats timeline for the minutes-​and-​seconds timeline and record a drone that lasts for 60 measures rather than 60 seconds. Spot check for this error, especially if it seems like a student’s screen appears very zoomed out or if they seem to be recording for a long time. Make sure that students are operating the Live browser properly. Many students will intend to add a new instrument and will either replace the current instrument (by pressing the Browse button) or will accidentally trigger the effect browser (also by pressing the Browse button, but sometimes by simply mistaking Add Effect for Add Track). In Live Standard and Suite, it is possible to add a picture to an audio track, but exporting this file as a video can give unpredictable results depending on which video codecs are installed on your computer. If you need to export a video, be sure the picture you imported is of a lower resolution than most video (no more than 1920 by 1080 pixels). Export it as a QuickTime video if possible.

9.5.9. Differentiated Instruction Students who are ahead near the end of the project can achieve an even more enigmatic sound by freezing and reversing clips. This technique is similar to freezing or exporting the drone sound at the beginning of the project. Solo a track, export a clip from it, and then drag the exported audio into a new track. Then try reversing it. Even better, reverse a duplicate and then crossfade it into or out of the original. Other advanced students may want to edit their videos to enhance the effect of the soundtrack. This is a great early application of interdisciplinary media creation, and you should encourage it. At a minimum, an advanced student may want to add

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filters to their video using iMovie, the iOS Photos app, or even a social media tool like Instagram. Students who fall behind in this open-​ended project usually have trouble making aesthetic decisions on their own. Many of these students may be secretly hoping that you will simply tell them which instruments to use. In these cases, make suggestions, but leave the decisions up to them. The note preview in the Push browser is useful here—​you can scroll through a few choices to show where the student should be looking, but allow the student to choose whether to load the track or not. There is a subtle but important difference between loading sounds for students and encouraging students to load them for themselves. Some students hit a creative wall early on because all their parts use the same pitch class. Encourage students to make sure they play some parts that are above the drone in pitch and others that are below it. Be sure to demonstrate these ideas to the whole class; many students will have trouble articulating what they think is “wrong” with their soundscape.

9.5.10. During Work Time Cruise around the room during work time making sure that students are able to add the things they want to add. There are not many technical hurdles in this project once the drone and picture are set up, but students will have a difficult time articulating their creative goals. Be available to give comments and to make suggestions that will help students achieve the mood they are looking for. It is easy to accidentally make a soundscape that sounds much scarier than the student intended.

9.5.11. Assessment Strategies 9.5.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Instruments should wash together, and at least some should have audible effects. • There are at least three or four parts in addition to the drone. 9.5.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • The piece is not too busy or chaotic-​sounding, unless it is clearly intentional. • Sounds match or attempt to match the mood of the picture. • Scale choice and the overall density of the soundscape have clear connection to the picture. • Sounds cover a wide frequency range, with added parts appearing below and above the pitch of the drone.

References Hein, E. (2010). Scales and emotions. ethanhein.com/​wp/​2010/​scales-​and-​emotions/​ Weidenbaum, M. (2014). Selected Ambient Works Volume II. Bloomsbury Academic.

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9.6. Project Example: Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop 9.6.1. Project Duration Seven to eight sessions.

9.6.2. Technical Goals • Students will learn extended sampling techniques, specifically relating to pitch and time shifting. • Students will apply sidechain gates and compression to their song.

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9.6.3. Creative Goals • Students will transform retro-​sounding material into more contemporary tracks. • Students will create their own adaptations of the provided sample library and use other examples of nostalgia-​tinged electronic music as a template for their own creation.

9.6.4. Listening Examples 9.6.4.1.  Vaporwave • Daniel Lopatin, Eccojams Vol. 1 (2010)—​compare to Toto, “Africa” (1982) • Macintosh Plus, “Floral Shoppe” (2011)—​ compare to Diana Ross, “It’s Your Move” (1984) • Blank Banshee, “Teen Pregnancy” (2012) 9.6.4.2. Lo-​fi hip-​hop • J Dilla, Donuts (2006) • Nujabes, Luv (2000–​2013) • glue70, “Talk to Yourself” (2016) • Lofi Girl [YouTube channel] 9.6.4.3. Older Nostalgia-​Tinged Electronic Music • The Art of Noise, “Moments in Love” (1984) • Brad Fiedel, “Desert Suite” (1991) from the Terminator 2 soundtrack • Future Sound of London, “Smokin’ Japanese Babe” (1994) • Boards of Canada, “Dayvan Cowboy” (2005)

9.6.5. Before Teaching This Lesson This project requires an extensive introduction, because it involves deconstructing two subgenres of music, vaporwave and lo-​fi hip-​hop. This can be a daunting task (see Chapter 6.9 for a detailed discussion). Some students will already be familiar with these styles, while others will have never heard of them before. You can serve both groups by starting with surface-​level tropes and then tracing their sources back to earlier and more obscure sources. You will need to provide lots of samples to get students started before they begin digging for their own. One good resource is the lost K-​Mart tape archive (Davis, 2015). A former employee of the once-​great retail chain digitized and uploaded several hours

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of the weekly tape loops that played in stores. These “Dead Sea scrolls of vaporwave” are typical of the genre’s juxtaposition of memory and commercialism, and they are an excellent sample library. Other potential sound sources include early computer startup chimes, video game console logos from the past, clips of The Simpsons, 1980s easy listening instrumentals, guitar-​based smooth jazz, or anything else that sounds “retro.” During your introduction, make sure to compare examples of vaporwave or lo-​fi hip-​hop to their sample sources. Many of the samples date to about 30 years before the birth of the artist, an example of the well-​documented 30-​year nostalgia cycle (see, for example, Metzger, 2017). These older samples will later be combined with more modern sounds to create both styles. This juxtaposition of old and new is succinctly described by prominent vaporwave artist Ramona Xavier (Vektroid/​Macintosh Plus): “step 1) do a skrillex  step 2) put funny saxophone on it” (personal communication, March 2, 2021). You may choose to combine styles, or if you prefer to keep it simple, choose one style and focus on it. It would be redundant to do each style as a separate project, since they involve similar production techniques and thematic content.

9.6.6. Project Design The flow of this project is similar to that of the sampling project (Chapter 9.8). Students begin with a core library of possible sounds and then search the internet to find samples of their own to personalize their tracks. The key difference is that this project uses more advanced production techniques: sidechain compression and gate. Students will also be creating their own drum patterns rather than sampling full loops, thus combining several techniques into one project. Beyond the in-​class instruction, encourage students to listen to and immerse themselves in their chosen style while they work on their projects. Provide them with lots of listening examples. They should start to notice some widely reused samples. For example, many vaporwave tracks sample “Africa” by Toto (1982). Lo-​fi hip-​hop tracks often sample the fairy saying “Listen!” from the Nintendo64 game The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (1998), as well as the sound of raindrops. The more of this material students absorb, the more they will feel immersed in the spirit of the subgenres. The project consists of three sections (three scenes in Session View). They can be thought of as the verse, chorus, and bridge, or simply as A, B, and C. The important thing is to have plenty of dynamic contrast and variety across sections.

9.6.7. Day-​by-​Day Plan 9.6.7.1. Session 1: Intro and Prep Begin this lesson with a deep dive on vaporwave. The genre is technically simple, but it is complex in its cultural context, subject matter, and aesthetic. Present a variety of listening examples along with their sample sources. For example, play “It’s Your Move” by Diana Ross (1984), and then “Floral Shoppe” by Macintosh Plus (2011) (Figure 9.8). The vaporwave aesthetic centers on retrofuturism, surrealism, cyberpunk, commercialism, and nostalgia for the recent past (Tanner, 2016; Trainer, 2016). Musically,

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Figure 9.8 “Floral Shoppe” by Macintosh Plus (aka Ramona Xavier) (2011).

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its main features are samples of 80s and 90s pop songs, Muzak, incidental music, and other “cheesy” sounds. The samples are looped, bitcrushed, slowed, and/​or pitched down. Vaporwave tracks typically use slow tempo hip-​hop or trap beats, detuned synthesizer chords, and heavy low-​pass filtering and sidechaining. Vaporwave visual imagery draws from corporate logos and advertising, early 3D computer graphics, and 80s/​90s TV shows (especially The Simpsons). The genre’s stylistic precursors include Trevor Horn and Art of Noise and Future Sound of London. Christopher Hunter (personal communication, July 24, 2019) explained that the “smooth jazz” genre fits the vaporwave aesthetic well, because it’s “fake, overpriced, and abandoned.” The difference is that smooth jazz has those characteristics unintentionally, while vaporwave producers embrace them deliberately and ironically. End the session by distributing the preselected sample packs to the students. In the remaining time, they can start to listen to the material and select items they may want to use in their project. 9.6.7.2. Sessions 2 to 3: Sampling and Repitching Before students begin gathering samples, make sure they have set their session tempo to around 80 BPM. For the first part of the project, students should build up a small library of instrumental loops. In Live, they can drag the song into a Session View clip and press the Loop button. Then they can easily isolate samples by moving the loop brackets (Figure 9.9). Vaporwave is friendly to “off-​time sampling”—​in other words, samples don’t need be perfectly tempo-​aligned. Have students collect three or four samples without drums.

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Figure 9.9 A sample of 80s music, pitched down and played back at a global tempo of 86 BPM—​ the original tempo was around 148 BPM, as shown.

189  For each sample, students should adjust the pitch and speed to suit the relaxed feel of the genres. If Live warped the sample too fast, try clicking the “*2” button in the clip detail panel to have it play back at half speed. Repitch all samples down at least three semitones. 9.6.7.3.  Drumbeats The class will have made several drum beats at this point, but it’s still important to model best practices. Either style can accommodate a laid-​back beat in the style of J Dilla. Vaporwave beats usually have straight hi-​hats, whereas lo-​fi hip-​hop should have slightly swung hi-​hats. Either way, use drum machine sounds rather than acoustic drums. Have students add a drum track and create three or four patterns. At least one should use only kick and snare. The beats should all be minimal, and they should be modeled after the listening examples. For example, if you just listened to “Talk to Yourself” by glue70 (2016), you might point out the following characteristics: • The drum kit sounds like a Roland TR-​707. • It might be low-​pass filtered. • It’s very dry-​sounding. • The snare is a rim shot, rather than a full snare sound. • The kicks have light swing. Don’t directly copy the listening examples, just aim for the same general feel. Let students create a few beats using this technique. If it helps them to play the beats along with their samples, they can, but they can also focus on the drums in isolation. By the end of this stage, you should have three or four samples on track one and three or four drum patterns on track two. 9.6.7.4. Sessions 4 to 5: Effects After creating the raw material for their tracks, students will need to apply some effects to create a hazy, nostalgic feeling. The two most important effects are low-​pass filtering and sidechain compressor. Make it mandatory that students use both. Low-​pass filtering means removing all the high frequencies, so only the low ones “pass” through. Use an EQ to cut all the frequencies above about 1,000 Hz. When you do this to the drum track, it should sound muffled, but with the cymbals still audible. Try a low-​pass filter on the sample track as well.

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A sidechain compressor automatically cuts the volume of a track in response to the sound of another track. The typical use case is to have a track “duck” every time the kick drum sounds. To set this up in Live, add a compressor to the audio track containing your samples (not to the drum track). Click the Sidechain button and set the “Audio from” to the kick of your drum kit track. Set the Ratio all the way up to “inf” and lower the Threshold about –​10 dB or until you can clearly hear the ducking effect. Adjust the Threshold further as needed. 9.6.7.5. Adding More Synth Parts As students develop their initial samples and drumbeats into fleshed-​out songs, they can add more synth tracks with new MIDI material. If they feel motivated to create parts by improvising on the controller or drawing, they should do so. If they struggle to come up with ideas this way, you can introduce some new techniques that might inspire them. First, try slicing up a sample and playing the slices as an “instrument.” In Live, add a Simpler track and drag an original sample into the “Drop Sample Here” area. Click the “Slice” mode. Use the handles to select an interesting area of the sample, and lower the Sensitivity setting so individual slices will be a little larger than the default. Now you have an instrument where each key or pad on the controller plays back a slice. (You may need to shift octaves up or down.) Disjointed sample fragments sound amazingly futuristic, especially with some delay and reverb on them. Another way to build new synth parts is to use Live’s audio-​to-​MIDI function, which you can access by right-​clicking or command-​clicking a sample. If it’s a monophonic melody, select “Convert melody to new MIDI track.” If it has chords, select “Convert harmony to new MIDI track.” The accuracy of these new MIDI parts will vary wildly depending on the source material. There will probably be some extraneous notes; you should delete them as you see fit (Figure 9.10). Be sure to change the default instrument to a groovy synth. At this point, the projects should all contain the original sample and drum tracks, some tasteful effects, and a few extra melodic or sampled tracks to personalize the song.

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9.6.7.6. Sessions 5 to 6 By now, students should be ready to work freely to achieve their vision. You can offer them optional ideas for improving and personalizing their sound. Have one-​on-​one meetings with students and ask them about the effects they are trying to achieve. Many students Figure 9.10 MIDI generated by converting a sample to a harmony MIDI clip. Sometimes these clips are chaotic. Don’t be afraid to delete large swaths of the auto-​ generated notes as needed.

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Figure 9.11 Sidechain gate, routed from the hi-​hat cymbal on the “Dummy Drums” track in the example set. Whenever the hi-​hat strikes, this synth briefly becomes audible. If the hi-​hat isn’t playing, the synth is silent even if notes are being played.

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do not know how to describe the sounds they hear, so their answers will require some translating on your part. You can also demonstrate some new processing techniques to the group: sidechain gate, frequency shifter, vinyl distortion, and redux. A sidechain gate is like a sidechain compressor, but instead of ducking a track’s volume in response to the drums, it mutes and unmutes the track (Figure 9.11). In Live, add a Gate device to a synth track (not to the drums). Click the Sidechain button and set the “Audio from” to the hi-​hat on the drum track. Now when you play both tracks, the synth will only be audible when the hi-​hat is sounding, giving you a rhythmic chattering effect. On the Gate effect’s graph, you should also see a readout of the hi-​hat. If the hi-​hat is triggering the gate but you do not hear any result, try lowering the Threshold. If the hi-​hat is not triggering the gate, ensure that it is actually playing, and that you set “Audio from” to the correct track. Sidechain gating is a great way to break up a synth part that would otherwise overpower other melodic material, or to simply add another point of rhythmic interest. A frequency shifter can make weird robotic and spaceship sounds, or a subtle tape warbling effect. To do the latter in Live, add a Frequency Shifter device to one of your synth tracks. Set the phase to 0º, which makes both left and right speakers change pitch at the same time. Set the LFO to 10.0 Hz, which controls how far off-​center the pitch will be shifted. Finally, leave the Rate at 0.5 Hz, which controls how often the pitch will shift—​in this case, once every two seconds. Frequency shifter sounds best when placed before EQ in the effects chain. Vinyl distortion makes a track sound like it is playing off a dusty old record. The effect works best placed before EQ in the effects chain so you can filter out the highest-​pitched crackles. Be advised that the vinyl crackle never stops, even when the music is stopped. Some students find this bothersome and prefer to use a prerecorded audio loop of vinyl crackle instead. Redux decreases the bit depth of your audio to make it sound like a sampler or video game console from the 1980s. In some DAWs, this effect is called Bitcrusher. To achieve the sound of the Fairlight CMI’s imaging frequency artifacts in the Terminator 2 (1991) listening example, set the Downsample setting to around 5. Try playing a low note, and you will hear some subtle digital distortion. If you play a low-​pitched trumpet fall from

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Simpler through a Redux device, you will hear a familiar film score trope. Examples include the T-​1000 theme from Terminator 2 and scenes featuring the Prowler in Spiderman: Into the Spider-​Verse (2018). Before moving to the next phase, students should have assembled two or three contrasting sections/​scenes, each with their own sequence of events. Students might approach the sections as a verse/​chorus/​bridge form, each containing multiple scenes/​ subsections. 9.6.7.7. Sessions 7 to 8: Assembling the Structure As in previous projects, this project is finished by assembling the various clips and sections into the timeline, or by recording a Session View performance to Arrangement View. In a more complex project, performing in real time might be too difficult. Students may prefer to copy and paste their clips from Session into Arrangement View and place them by hand. Be sure that they click the orange “Back to Arrangement” button to unlock Arrangement mode. Now is the time to listen to the projects and engage in meaningful conversations about the musical journey they represent. Ideally, students will be enjoying what they have made, whether or not it is their preferred style of music. Young people are naturally self-​critical, and you should encourage them to chase their gut feelings as they complete their tracks. At this point, the project is less a set of instructions and more a framework for exploring techniques, allowing students to express themselves personally, particularly via the nostalgia aspects of the project. This final stage is also the time to help students who missed crucial steps earlier on. In any self-​directed project, there will be wide divergence between high-​and low-​achieving students, so be prepared to help the latter play catch-​up. The completed projects should exhibit good general song structure characteristics: eight-​bar phrasing, with “fuzzy” boundary zones right before section changes (Figure 9.12).

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Figure 9.12 A finished vaporwave track. The form is fluid in this project, and much of the structure is achieved through slowly bringing parts to the foreground and retiring others to the background (as in the Soundscape project).

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9.6.8.  Troubleshooting As with any sampling-​intensive project, students will have their audio files go missing—​in Live, they will see the orange “Media Files are Missing” bar at the bottom of the screen. Expect to fix this for multiple students, and use “Collect all and save” after you fix the problem. Some students will miss the instruction to change the tempo at the beginning of this project. It’s important to check everyone’s session tempo before moving on, as it affects all sampling operations later. During any genre-​focused project, some students will struggle because they don’t like the style of music. These students should be assured that the project is just a vehicle for learning advanced techniques. If they want to make, say, a more trap-​sounding track, let them, as long as they are using the sampling techniques. If a student is a guitarist, encourage them to sample their own guitar playing. Some of the best projects end up not sounding like your demo, while other good ones adhere to it strictly. The important thing is that students are able to find their own voice. If students don’t immediately hear the result of adding an effect, they may keep double-​ clicking it in the browser. If you see a project that has multiple instances of an effect (e.g., ten EQs in a row), ask whether it was intentional. However, be mindful of the Prime Directive (Chapter 6.11)—​you can always mute an “incorrect” track or effect rather than deleting it. Finally, Ramona Xavier (Vektroid/​Macintosh Plus) shares some advice for students working to connect several disparate sampled ideas into one continuous song: “always hit save, always render, and always be thinking of ways you can merge all those sketches into one big song. eventually you do enough stuff that you can jigsaw a bunch of 90 second tracks into a 12 minute one . . . It’s pretty easy for anyone to do if they crank out a lot of material but can't figure out how to tie it together. use one song as your hook and nothing else. use another as the intro and the first drop. use one as interludes between the two. eventually you fill the gaps” (personal communication, March 2, 2021)!

9.6.9. Differentiated Instruction Advanced students may want to replicate your demo exactly, and you will need to encourage them to find their own voice. Encourage them to locate examples of commercial music from their childhood or memories to add to their project. Lower-​performing students most often need help getting started during the sampling portion of the project. They may benefit from using the same samples as the demo project, at least at the outset. If they have a little success replicating your example, they will feel more free to express themselves toward the end of the project. Conversely, if they feel like they are behind at the outset, they will miss out on later steps that are actually easier. Resist the temptation to move on if nobody is asking questions—​listen to the less active-​looking projects and, based on what you hear, decide whether the students are really ready to move on or not.

9.6.10. During Work Time Listen, listen, listen. Many of these projects can be managed through visual inspection, but this one in particular can look correct while not sounding correct due to the low track

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and clip count. Also, because the music is a more experimental, students might be more hesitant to let you listen. Find a noninvasive way to hear projects in the early stages so no student gets too far behind. The advanced techniques only make sense if you have heard multiple examples of them in real music. Push harder than usual to keep students listening to examples. You might even give students a small assignment where they reflect on the listening examples or spend a portion of each session discussing them.

9.6.11. Assessment Strategies 9.6.11.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration

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• Tempo is between 60 and 90 BPM. • There is at least one smooth-​sounding sample, slowed and pitched down. • There is at least one contrasting drum track. • Sidechain compressor or gate technique is used, either ducking or gating a synth from a drum part. 9.6.11.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • There are additional synth parts, or MIDI clips that have been converted from a sample and cleaned up. • Some personal exploration of the past is evident in the sample choices. • There are smooth transitions between sections: drum fills, one-​shot FX, fuzzy boundaries.

References Davis, M. (2015). Attention K-​Mart shoppers. archive.org/​details/​attentionkmartshoppers Metzger, P. (2017). The nostalgia pendulum: A rolling 30-​year cycle of pop culture trends. The Patterning. thepatterning.com/​2017/​02/​13/​the-​nostalgia-​pendulum-​a-​rolling-​30-​year-​ cycle-​of-​pop-​culture-​trends/​ Tanner, G. (2016). Babbling corpse: Vaporwave and the commodification of ghosts. John Hunt Publishing. Trainer, A. (2016). From Hypnagogia to Distroid: Postironic musical renderings of personal memory. In S. Whiteley & S. Rambarran (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of music and virtuality (pp. 409–​427). Oxford University Press.

9.7. Project Example: Video Beatboxing 9.7.1. Project Duration Five to six sessions.

9.7.2. Technical Goals • Students will apply basic timeline editing skills to video. • Students will use the timeline’s beat grid as a new way to make drumbeats. • Students will experience the challenges of working with video, as well as the similarities and differences between video and audio.

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9.7.3. Creative Goals • Students will examine the similarities and differences between how things look on camera and how they sound. • Students will decide which sounds they can make on camera that are analogous to standard drum set sounds (kick, snare, etc.). • Students will construct drumbeats through editing, rather than through sequencing.

9.7.4. Video Examples • Lasse Gjertsen, “Hyperactive” • Lasse Gjertsen, “Amateur” • “Cool beans” scene from the movie Hot Rod • Kit Kat “City Steps” commercial • “Chee” from Tim and Eric: Awesome Show, Great Job! • Andrew Huang, “24K Magic” by Bruno Mars—​played with 24 carrots

9.7.5. Audio Examples of Found Sounds in the Drum Parts • Anything produced by Timbaland, particularly “Cry Me A River” by Justin Timberlake (2002) • Sylvan Esso, “Could I Be” (2014) • Billie Eilish, “Bad Guy” (2019)

9.7.6. Before Teaching This Lesson This is a quick, silly project that ends up being a favorite of many students. It does not require much preparation, but we recommend that you do the project yourself before demonstrating it to a class. You can use a variety of methods and tools. A DAW will work, as will video editing software like Adobe Premiere or Final Cut Pro. The main requirement is that the software be capable of frame-​level editing, which is the ability to edit a video to cut at a specific frame. As of this writing, many popular free video editors such as iMovie do not have this feature. The standard frame rate for video recorded on a smartphone is about 30 frames per second—​in other words, each frame is one thirtieth of a second long. In iMovie, you can only edit at a resolution of one tenth of a second, which is insufficiently precise for music purposes. The point of the project is to use ordinary sounds in a rhythmic way, and if the sounds in the video clips are even a few milliseconds out of sync, the results will be noticeably sloppy and unmusical.

9.7.7. Project Design The object of this project is to produce a video of a drumbeat that is at least 30 seconds long. The video can also include additional sounds or loops. Students will create the beats by recording themselves making sounds, and they will edit the recordings down to clips that each contain a single “drum hit.” They will then place the clips on the timeline to create drum patterns. For example, they might record a high five and use it as a snare drum by duplicating it and placing it on beats two and four in each measure.

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The project is similar to the beatmaking project (Chapter 8.7), but using video clips rather than audio. While the editing techniques are similar, the application of the techniques will feel very different for some students. Producers like Jlin and Oddisee prefer to manually place drum hits on the timeline or MIDI piano roll, rather than using a controller or pattern sequencer. This project is a good introduction to their beatmaking method. The video element of the project makes it well suited to working in pairs or small groups. Students can brainstorm techniques or props that can generate the loud snap of a snare drum, the low thump of a kick, and the thin metallic noise of a hi-​hat. Other sounds can be included, too, but a kick/​snare pattern is the best basis for a satisfying rhythmic groove. At the conclusion of the project, the videos can be moved from the DAW into a simple video editor to add titles and video filters. Frame-​level editing is not necessary for this stage, so iMovie will work fine. Will likes to use this project as a reward toward the end of the semester, but you can use it any time your students need a fun mental break.

9.7.8. Day-​by-​Day Plan 9.7.8.1. Session 1: Intro and Prep Start by showing the Lasse Gjertsen (2006) videos. They were some of the first viral videos from YouTube’s early days, when digital cameras and nonlinear digital editing were both becoming more prevalent. Gjersten was a film student working with consumer-​ level equipment, only four years after the release of Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, the first major film to be shot entirely with digital cinema cameras. At the time, film editors were still accustomed to editing with traditional linear splicing techniques, some still on actual film reels. Gjertsen’s technique of repeated copying and pasting is tedious using film, but it is comparatively effortless with digital video. After showing some examples of videos chopped into a rhythmic sequence, let students choose a partner and start brainstorming how they will film their own videos. On the first day, it is not necessary to film anything. Instead, the class should just plan what props they want to use and discuss location ideas. 9.7.8.2. Session 2: Filming It will probably be easiest for students to record video with their phones. They can also use laptop cameras or borrow a school camera. Begin by giving them some guidelines for making their videos look and sound the best they can: • Stabilize the camera. If tripods are not available, prop the camera up against a book, a locker, or a wall. The desired effect is like stop motion—​the viewer knows that the footage has been edited, but they still experience the beat as “really happening.” This effect is only attainable if the background is stable. • Shoot in landscape. “But people are vertical!” True, but screens are in landscape. Shoot close to your subject and focus on the area where sound is being made. It is not necessary to fit the entire person in the frame (Figure 9.13). • Do not shoot toward a window, unless you are trying to make silhouettes. • Record long shots and edit them down later. You can edit your clips to be as long or short as you want, and you may capture some happy accidents along the way.

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Figure 9.13 A and B: Students framed in good shots, recording their sounds.

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You should confine louder projects to controlled spaces. If students are going to be shooting video around the school, be sure to warn other classes. (A former Marine teaches social studies in Will’s school, and students made him panic when they popped a balloon near his classroom.) Give students about 30 minutes to record their clips. Correct any major filming errors you see, but allow the students freedom to experiment too. As groups finish filming, they will need to transfer their videos onto their workstations. Plan to have a few Lightning, micro-​USB, or USB-​C cables available if students have to transfer videos by wire. If you have Mac computers, it will be easiest to transfer the files using Airdrop. Students with Android devices may need to use the Android File Transfer app on a Mac. If these methods fail, you can upload footage to Google Drive and then use the computer’s web browser to

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download it. Sometimes group members will want to each take the footage and create separate projects, which is fine. 9.7.8.3. Sessions 3 to 4: Editing Students should use their existing knowledge of drum programming to edit their footage into recognizable beats. There is one critical difference between video and audio: the treatment of empty space. Abrupt silence between audio clips is acceptable or even desirable in electronic music. However, in video, abrupt visual blackouts are jarring and disruptive, so students will need to fill all gaps in the timeline. Begin your demonstration with the snare sound. Set the looping brace to one bar (1.0.0) and switch looping on. Zoom in so sixteen tick marks appear between measure one and measure two. Edit the snare sound so the transient (audio spike) aligns to the left edge of the clip. (In Live, holding the command key while adjusting the clip’s edge will allow off-​the-​grid edits.) Place the snare sound on beat two (1.2.0 on the timeline), shorten the clip to be one beat long, and copy and paste it to beat four (1.4.0 on the timeline). Next, place the kick drum on beat one, and in a few other locations between the snares. Fill the remaining space with a shorter, softer cymbal sound. You now have a one-​ measure drumbeat (Figure 9.14). Finally, turn the beat into a phrase by copying and pasting it a few times. This will make the beat sound purposeful rather than accidental—​musical repetition acts as a “handprint of human intention” (Margulis, 2013, p. 59). As students work based on your demonstration, they can make their beat sound more like something a drummer might play by following three repeats of the pattern with a more complex fill or variation. They can continue to build the larger pattern in four-​bar phrases. Some students may need a review of drum programming fundamentals. Give a series of guidelines that begin very strict and get looser as the list progresses:

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• The kick drum plays on beat one almost always. • Snare drums play on beats two and four most of the time. Figure 9.14 Drum groove over two measures with snare sound on beat three (halftime feel). Notice there is no dead space in the clip before the sound starts. For grid alignment to work and to sound correct, there needs to be a very precise edit so the transient (peak) of the sound is aligned to the beginning of the clip.

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• Kicks play between and around the snare hits. • Hi-​hats double the other drum hits and fill empty space as needed. Because this editing technique is labor-​intensive, require students to make only about 30 seconds of groove. 9.7.8.4. Session 5: Finishing Once students have created their 30-​second drumbeats, they can enhance them using other loops and samples, either from the DAW’s loop library or from external sources (Figure 9.15). They can also export their video from the DAW and use iMovie or similar software to add simple titles, credits, or silly video effects. It is important for artists not to take themselves too seriously, and this project is a good opportunity to practice playfulness and make unexpected discoveries.

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9.7.9.  Troubleshooting When students are filming, some will need in-​person reinforcement of camera guidelines. Many will try to shoot using a handheld device or in portrait mode. Reinforce the idea that the students will get better results with a stable camera in landscape orientation. Students will need one-​on-​one guidance to precisely trim the beginning of each clip. Help them do this before they organize too many clips into patterns to save them time and effort later in the process. Occasionally, DAW software will import video flipped on the x-​axis (upside down). If this happens, you can use a video editing program like iMovie to flip the video, export it, and reimport it into your DAW. Alternatively, if all of the video is upside down, have students do their rhythmic editing and then flip the entire finished video in iMovie.

Figure 9.15 Complete project with three drum groove sections. Additional synth loops have been added to provide a bit of musical context to the manual drum editing.

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Students will often not choose the best sound for their snare. A good rule of thumb is to use the loudest sound recorded as the snare, regardless of pitch—​phone microphones do not have a wide frequency range anyway. If none of the sounds make a suitable snare, allow the group to film more material. Sometimes when copying whole patterns, students will paste off the bar line, resulting in a loop that’s internally rhythmic, but not exactly four beats long. Experienced musicians will immediately notice this, but novices may not know why their loop is off-​kilter.

9.7.10. Differentiated Instruction

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This project is designed with plenty of runway for advanced students, who will find opportunities to impress and outdo other groups with elaborate videos, extended editing techniques, and storyline elements. For a real challenge, they might even try making two projects at the same speed and using iMovie to layer them in a side-​by-​side view, similar to Gjertsen’s “Amateur” video. Many students will struggle to make the initial drumbeat. In these cases, you can help by placing the snare sound on beats two and four for them. Then they can fill in the rest. Our formula for drumbeats sounds complex, but it’s actually simple—​if you obey the backbeat rule, everything else will sound intentional.

9.7.11. During Work Time More than in other projects, it is important to make sure that students get this one started correctly. You can still respect the Prime Directive (Chapter 6.11), but in the beginning stages, technical problems will impede students’ creative ideas. Cruise around often and intervene assertively. Show the group some projects made by previous classes (if you have them). Students should see that successful project don’t not need to use high-​quality video or audio. Also, you can demonstrate how much advanced file management is necessary to pull the project off.

9.7.12. Assessment Strategies 9.7.12.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Editing is precise (note onsets are in tempo and there are no black screen flashes). • Snare drums fall on beats two and four. • Loops are cut precisely to the bar (no copy/​paste errors). 9.7.12.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Project has some kind of theme, props, or intent beyond body percussion. • Volume levels of clips match. • Project has definite groove in the beats. • Bonus: Project has additional musical loops or video layers beyond the basic video beat.

References Gjertsen, L. (2006). “Hyperactive” [YouTube video]. youtube.com/​watch?v=o9698TqtY4A Gjertsen, L. (2006). “Amateur” [YouTube video]. youtube.com/​watch?v=JzqumbhfxRo

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Heidecker, T., & Wareheim, E. (2013). Tim and Eric: Awesome Show, Great Job!—​“Chee” [YouTube video]. youtube.com/​watch?v=HWZFqEXH5a0 Huang, A. (2016). “’24K Magic’ by Bruno Mars—​played with 24 carrots” [YouTube video]. youtu.be/​g8_​g5WXmMC0 Margulis, E. (2013). On repeat: How music plays the mind. Oxford University Press. Shaffer, A. (2007). Hot Rod. Paramount Pictures. Thenowcorporation. (2011). “Kit Kat city steps commercial” [YouTube video]. youtube.com/​ watch?v=uv2SaE-​2Tr4

9.8. Project Example: Sampling 9.8.1. Project Duration Six to eight sessions.

9.8.2. Technical Goals • Students will learn how to isolate an instrumental sample from an existing song. • Students will adjust the tempo of an existing song to match the project’s global tempo. • Students will synchronize loops sampled from multiple songs to form a new piece of music.

9.8.3. Creative Goals • Students will be able to distinguish between loops containing drums and loops without drums. • Students will think critically about sample sources and consider how samples can sound “original” or “unoriginal” depending on usage. • Students will think beyond whether they like or dislike a song, and will instead practice “DJ consciousness” (Sinnreich, 2010, p. 202)—​listening to recordings for their creative potential.

9.8.4. Listening Examples RUN-​D.M.C., “Peter Piper” (1986) Bob James, “Take Me To The Mardi Gras” (1975) De La Soul, “Eye Know” (1989) Lee Dorsey, “Get Out of My Life, Woman” (1966) Otis Redding, “(Sittin’ on) the Dock of the Bay” (1968) The Mad Lads, “Make This Young Lady Mine” (1969) Steely Dan, “Peg” (1977) Britney Spears, “Toxic” (2003) Lata Mangeshkar and S. P. Balasubrahmanyam, “Tere Mere Beech Mein” (1981) Drake, “Hotline Bling” (2016) Timmy Thomas, “Why Can’t We Live Together” (1972) Juice WRLD, “Lucid Dreams (Forget Me)” (2018) Sting, “Shape Of My Heart” (1993)

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Lil Nas X, “Old Town Road” (2018) Nine Inch Nails, “34 Ghosts IV” (2008)

9.8.5. Before Teaching This Lesson The key to this project is being able to demonstrate sampling and beatmatching examples from the wild and making it look easy during your demonstration. If it takes you many tries, or you can only make a sample match the metronome with manual fiddling, students will conclude that it is beyond their ability. A good way to practice is to simply do the project along with the students. But be sure to try it on your own before teaching it for the first time! We also recommend providing students with some “frictionless” sampling ideas. Ethan curates a folder of classic breakbeats that lend themselves to effortless sampling and that match with nearly any material. Will recommends that his students practice sampling from a folder with songs preselected for having easy-​to-​sample intro sections before they choose a song of their own for the project. Session View works well for this kind of practice, because it encourages students to try a lot of ideas without being anxious about deleting them. The best way to prepare to make music with samples is to listen to other sample-​ based music. It’s also a good idea to be able to distinguish samples (the use of existing audio) from interpolations (quotations of existing ideas that are replayed, not sampled directly). Sampling and interpolation have different creative meaning, and they also have different legal implications. We discuss this in depth below.

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9.8.6. A Crash Course in Musical Intellectual Property In order to legally use a sample in a commercial recording, you need two separate permissions (Figure 9.16). One is from the owner of the master recording (typically a record label), and the other is from the owner of the underlying composition (typically a songwriter or publisher). Rights holders will usually only grant permission in exchange for a fee, and they are free to charge whatever amount they see fit. This is quite different from the rules for performing or recording cover songs. Congress established a compulsory license for covers, meaning that songwriters must license their songs in exchange for a fee that is set by statute. As a result, licensing covers is easy and inexpensive. Licensing samples, on the other hand, is an opaque and complicated process, and it can be expensive.

Figure 9.16 Performance (P in the circle) rights differ from music and lyrics rights (C in the circle).

Copyright over one performance (recording)

Copyright over music & lyrical content (songwriting)

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Artists use clearance services, which in turn hire entertainment lawyers to contact labels and publishers on their behalf to negotiate clearance deals. There is considerable anxiety and uncertainty around using samples without permission. Educational usage is covered by the fair use exception to copyright law, so you should not worry about record labels suing you or your students. However, if students want to release their sample-​based tracks commercially, they will need to clear them (Cronin, 2016). Some artists prefer to avoid the difficulty and expense of licensing by hiring studio musicians to replay or interpolate their samples. Copyright applies only to top-​line melodies, so a replayed bassline or keyboard riff is usually fair game. However, this solution is unsatisfying to most sampling artists. The point of sampling is to bring in not just the melodies and rhythms from the source recordings, but also the specific timbres, reverbs, and other sonic intangibles.

9.8.7. Project Design Your students will have recorded and worked with audio and MIDI from both inside and outside of the DAW at this point. However, they will not have sampled or beatmatched outside of the simple remix project (Chapter 7.4), which was heavily guided. Think of this sampling project as the “Complex Remix” project, except the result will be more like an original piece of music or a DJ set, rather than a new version of an existing song. This project has three stages. First, students learn how to sample loops from a set of practice songs. Next, they take samples from songs of their own choice. Finally, they use a selection of their samples to create a new song. This is similar to the arranging clips project (Chapter 7.2), but the students are making their own loop library from pieces of existing songs.

9.8.8. Day-​by-​Day Plan 9.8.8.1. Session 1 Begin with a sampling demo. It should be a confidence-​building experience, so begin with something easy: a drum break. Will uses the break from “The Funky Drummer Parts One and Two” by James Brown (1970). He speeds it up and raises its pitch, and then compares it to the drum break in the theme song to The Powerpuff Girls. Ethan samples the horn and percussion riff in “Are You My Woman (Tell Me So)” by the Chi-​Lites (1970) and then compares it to the more familiar “Crazy in Love” by Beyoncé featuring Jay-​Z (2003). After giving the brief demo, guide the class through some critical listening to famous sample-​based tracks. Ask students to comment on whether each sample usage improves or expands on the original, or whether it is simply a “rip-​off.” Someone will inevitably bring up a high-​profile plagiarism case. It’s a good idea at this point to clarify the difference between sampling and interpolation, and between licensed sampling and theft. Will likes to frame the discussion around the idea of “good sampling” and “bad sampling,” in the creative, rather than legal, sense. Many of the least creative sample usages have been licensed, while some of the most creative ones have been illegal. Students should learn to articulate the musical reasons why a particular sample sounds “ripped off” or uncreative, and why another is fresh and appealing.

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By our standards, “good” sampling brings a song to a new audience, sounds original to the untrained ear, is clever or unexpected, and feels like a well-​motivated artistic choice. “Bad” sampling replays a song to people who are overly familiar with it, sounds unoriginal to too many people, is boring or repetitive, and feels like pandering or laziness. “Good” and “bad” sampling are subjective terms, of course, but we believe that developing strong opinions on this topic is as essential to an electronic musician’s development as learning software functionality or instrument technique. Many students will not have thought deeply about these issues before, and the discussion will probably be lively and impassioned. Will compares it to the first time he learned about movie special effects and how actors are often composited in front of a green screen rather than going on location. Ethan likes to explain sampling as a kind of hyperlink between two pieces of music. It is not uncommon for a sampled track to contain samples of its own, thus leading to convoluted chains of intertextual reference. One such chain of nested references centers on “Bam Bam” by Sister Nancy (1982), a reggae classic that has been sampled in dozens of hip-​hop songs. For example, Main Source samples the horn riff in “Just Hangin’ Out” (1991), Lauryn Hill interpolates the chorus in “Lost Ones” (1998), and half of Kanye West’s “Famous” (2016) is given over to a reharmonized and resequenced sample of the vocal (Hein, 2018). Sister Nancy’s song is, in turn, comprised of recontextualized elements. Her instrumental backing is a remixed version of “Stalag 17” by Winston Riley (1973), a widely used reggae riddim. Also, her chorus is a quote from “Bam Bam” by Toots Hibbert (1966). With any time remaining, you can have students start on the next part of this project. 9.8.8.2. Session 2 The next few sessions are all about practicing sampling. Distribute a folder of vetted music with easy-​to-​sample intros. You want to teach students to listen like a producer, identifying parts of a track that would make a good sample. You can help them by pointing out two important main categories of samples: unaccompanied drums and unaccompanied instruments or vocals. If you look at lists of the most-​sampled recordings (e.g., Read, 2016), they are almost always sounds found “in the clear” rather than full-​band passages. Aside from the occasional “hah” or “unnnh” from James Brown, you generally want to avoid samples with lyrics. From a technical perspective, it is easiest to sample the intro of a song. If the start point of a sample is set correctly, Live will get the rest of it in sync automatically 90% of the time. Teach students to find the first beat/​note of the song and to mouse over the locator mark points over the waveform. Double-​click at the song start to add a yellow beat mark. Right-​click the beat mark and select “Set 1.1.1 here.” Now listen to it with the metronome on—​the metronome click should align with the rhythm of the song. Remind students that the song will probably sound different than it did originally, because they are speeding it up or slowing it down (Figure 9.17). As a trained musician, you will notice several potential problems with this gross oversimplification of how beats and measures work. The challenge is to explain the process without going into so much detail that you stress out the novices. Reassure them that not every sample is easy to isolate and loop. Tell students, “If you’re not sure whether you did

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Figure 9.17 Two-​bar drum loop for “Another One Bites the Dust” by Queen (1980). The start point has been manually set on beat one, which is the third transient spike (after the pickup notes from the bass guitar). The mark on the first transient is where the computer initially thought the sample should start. Once you fix the start point, most beat-​driven samples will properly synchronize with the global tempo.

it right, don’t bang your head against the wall, just try another one.” It helps to have a wide selection of James Brown songs and other sampling-​friendly artists for the class to dig through during the practicing stage of the project. After you set the start point for the sample, click the Loop button. By default, Live creates a one-​bar loop, which is okay for now. This can be changed later, but for now the goal is to avoid the possibility of uneven loops. 9.8.8.3. Sessions 3 to 5 As students collect loops from the practice tracks, they should organize them onto two tracks, labeled “not drums” and “drums only” (Figure 9.18). Some students will have an easy time sorting samples into these categories, while others will struggle. If they aren’t sure which category to use, they should put the sample in “not drums.” The idea here is that anything from the “drums only” track will sound good juxtaposed with anything from the “not drums” track, without serious clashes of harmony or texture. Give soft targets for how many loops you think the students can complete in a day’s work: “By the end of this period, you should have five loops in each track.” Every student should have a few loops that sound good and are synced correctly by the time they move on to searching for their own material. 9.8.8.4. Digging the Crates The real fun begins as students start searching for samples from songs of their own choosing. The term “digging the crates” refers to the practice of flipping through crates of vinyl records in search of samples. In the present, digging the crates usually means listening through songs on iTunes or YouTube. Mac users can easily record audio from any application, including the web browser, using a program called Audio Hijack. There are many other ways to convert digital audio into sampling-​friendly formats, and students should never resort to recording from a phone speaker into a microphone (unless they want poor recording quality for some artistic reason).

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Figure 9.18 Samples divided into “not drums” and “drums only.”

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Remind the class what types of loops to look for. If you haven’t talked about good and bad sampling, now is an excellent time to do so. You want the students to dig for high-​ quality loops! Give the students these guidelines for selecting good samples: • If you want to sample a newer song, check WhoSampled.com to see if the instrumental track is itself a sample. If it is, sample the older material so you can put your own unique twist on it. • If you want to sample a hip-​hop track, use the instrumental—​it will be easier to sample and you will avoid unwanted profanity. • Think like a producer. The best samples do not always come from the best songs, so branch out and try some ideas that might not be “cool” on the surface. Remember, too, that drumbeats do not necessarily have to come from songs. Drum set instructional videos are great sources for beats. Search for “hip-​hop drum lesson” and you’ll find several hundred videos of people in small rooms talking and then playing drums. Do a demo to remind the class how to use the “Set 1.1.1” command when the recording does not jump straight into the music. It is also a good idea to demonstrate sampling a few clips each time you meet with students, so they can see you encountering the same issues they are facing. For example, setting the start point of the track does not always get the music in sync with the metronome. Below, we address some common sync issues.

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9.8.8.5. Common Sync Issues Why Is My Music Much Slower/​Faster Than Expected? Check the “math buttons” in the clip detail panel. These can adjust the clip’s speed by 2× in either direction, slower or faster. Nothing Matches Anything To fix more serious sync problems, you will need to play around with Live’s warp methods. By default, Live will warp the track based on where it thinks beat one is located. The software tries to find other downbeats throughout the music. If it misses, it can miss spectacularly. Here are a few strategies to try to get a stubborn track in sync: • Strategy 1: Simply select the region that you want to loop, right-​click, and select “Loop selection as _​_​-​bar loop.” This is an effective cure for most sync issues. • Strategy 2: Try marking a known beat other than beat one (for example, beat four). If there is a crisp snare attack that is definitely on beat four and you line it up with Live’s beat four, warping from that point may yield better results than warping from beat one. • Strategy 3: Try other warp algorithms. Right-​click the beat one marker you made when you selected the track and select an algorithm that is not the default “Warp from Here.” Depending on which of these options you choose, there will be new Warp Markers placed throughout the track, with varying results. Ideally, one of them will solve the problem. If it doesn’t . . . • Strategy 4: Unwarp the track and use the Tap Tempo feature to get the global tempo closer to the track’s tempo. Then, turn warping on again to have it recalculate the tempo. • Strategy 5: Place Warp Markers manually based on your own musical knowledge. This strategy should be a last resort. It is effective but labor-​intensive, and it requires some sophistication. 9.8.8.6. Sessions 6 to 7: Finishing the Track By this point, everyone has ideally had some degree of success sampling material that they find interesting, from both drum sources and not-​drum sources. After most students have a few working loops, encourage them to take a mental break from the technical process of synchronizing and beatmatching clips so they can focus instead on the mood they are trying to create. It is one thing to force several clips to play together at the same tempo, but the real mission here is to do it in a way that makes musical sense. If students have found a drumbeat and a not-​drum loop that go well together, branch off from there. They should find other clips that use similar sounds, so that the next great combination feels like it belongs in the same song. Students should continue until they have three or four good combinations. It can be helpful to personify the loops. Does a combination sound like Miles Davis doing a collab with Missy Elliott? Aretha Franklin with Led Zeppelin? Drake with Joni Mitchell? Challenge advanced students to choose samples conceptually. Pair classical strings with hip-​hop drums, hi-​fi drums with lo-​fi keyboards, chopped-​up rock guitar with electro drums, or samples taken exclusively from Michael Jackson songs. It’s best when students invent their own concepts. They can dream up some pretty wild combinations!

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Figure 9.19 Arrangement View after triggering clips à la carte. Notice how each clip dovetails to the next, similar to a DJ set.

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After everyone has a few good combinations organized into scenes, students can record from Session View to Arrangement View in whatever order they like. Some will want to record by scene and others will launch their clips à la carte (Figure 9.19). Either way, try to reinforce four-​or eight-​bar phrases. After they have recorded to Arrangement View, give students some time to practice good finishing techniques: transition bars, fuzzy boundaries, and an intro and ending.

9.8.9.  Troubleshooting Most of the issues students will face in this project involve clip synchronization. Inexperienced musicians will not always be able to tell if their loops are in sync or not, so be sure to do lots of spot checks. Make sure that loops are set to the right tempo, that they start on a downbeat, and that they are an even number of bars in length. As you practice sampling yourself, you will quickly learn to recognize and correct these issues. Some students will have trouble organizing their clips into drums/​not-​drums. Wait until about halfway through the crate digging task and then help students organize as you check to make sure their loops are in sync. As students search for tracks to sample, they will find their way to sleazy download sites and YouTube conversion tools. You may need to teach them how to navigate past the spam windows, fake buttons, and pop-​ups. If you can install ad-​blocking browser extensions on your lab computers, it will make this process less painful. As in all sample-​based projects, you will face the persistent hazard of audio files that go missing because they were deleted, moved, or renamed. If this happens, Live will show an orange bar across the bottom of the screen with a message about missing media files. You can prevent this by having students use the “Collect All and Save” command. This is especially important if the project needs to be moved to another computer—​Live will not move samples that are outside the project folder unless you specifically tell it to. In DAWs that do not have an equivalent command, you can achieve the same thing manually by making sure to always place duplicates of any audio files used in a project in the same folder as the project itself. File management aside, it may be helpful to provide strategies for combining samples from songs in an effective way. The same strategies used here for creating one song can also be applied in long-​form DJ sets, crafting transitions around combinations that work well (Figure 9.20).

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Figure 9.20 “Making a Good DJ Set,” student-​created instructions for DJing written by Kelsee Etmans, Lebanon High School, Class of 2017.

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9.8.10. Differentiated Instruction Advanced students typically do not need much technical help with this project, because they have more musical experience and are thus better equipped to match beats and compare tracks to a metronome. What they might need from you is some inspiration or a challenge. Talk to them about what kinds of music they listen to, and how they might approach music they don’t usually listen to. If advanced students need more ideas, do a short demonstration of Slice mode in Simpler. Instead of dragging a clip into Session View, drag it into Simpler’s device box and press “Slice” to map segments of the sample across several drum pads. Combine this with the Repeat button on Push to get tempo-​synced skips that sound like DJ scratches. Ethan likes to raise the stakes for advanced students by imposing additional constraints. For example, challenge them to make a new piece of music using only samples from a single song. See how creative they can get with chopping and resequencing small parts of the song into new melodies, rhythms, and even lyrics.

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This project is an excellent opportunity to get to know your students’ listening habits, so don’t waste it. Keep close watch on the tastemakers. Learn what they like, and build their trust. These students will soon be leaders (see Chapter 14 for a deep dive into student-​led groups). Did they sample someone who has been in the news? Talk about it. Did they sample an artist you haven’t heard before? Ask for recommendations. Students who struggle with this project can adapt in many ways. If you feel that the audio manipulation part of the project is more important than the crate-​digging part, it is fine to limit students to tracks you provide. If they are struggling to find matches and they can’t sync their samples, let them use prerecorded or pre-​edited drum loops from the Loops folder and have them focus their attention on sampling melodic material. Since the drums will be in time, misaligned samples will sound like a plausible artistic choice rather than a mistake. Some students won’t realize their music is out of sync and won’t know to ask for help. Do your best to nip this problem in the bud before they get to the recording stage.

9.8.11. During Work Time Since the pace of this lesson is largely student-​driven, take some time with each student as they build their sample list. It’s easy to walk around the room and see busy students “on task,” but to really know what’s in their heads, you need to engage beyond telling them to “ask if you need help.” Will likes to get in a wheeled chair and move down the rows, looking closely at each project. Students who know what’s going on usually look like they’re actively clicking. Students who are having trouble look more like they’re sitting back and just listening to music. Try not to let the class get stuck in the YouTube vortex. Digging for samples can quickly turn into watching more videos, which then turns into watching whatever video is up next. Monitor for content and keep them on task. Some students hear you say “look for music” and take it to mean “listen to music the whole time.” They may not be quite mature enough to handle digging for tracks in the wild without getting distracted. “Airpods under the big headphones” is a real thing that happens (the digital version of having a MAD magazine tucked in your history book). If you notice this happening, redirect positively. Talk about what they’re listening to and take mental notes as you help them make progress on their project.

9.8.12. Assessment Strategies 9.8.12.1. Things to Listen for: Technical Demonstration • Loops are in sync. • There are four-​or eight-​bar phrases. • Bonus: Alternate sampling methods like stutter edit and Simpler are used. 9.8.12.2. Things to Listen for: Aesthetic Intent • Music is balanced between drum and not-​drum parts. • Samples seem to have a theme or mood. • Samples sound unique and do not sound identical to your demo project. • Musically satisfying transitions occur between sections.

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References Cronin, C. (2016). Music copyright infringement resource. mcir.usc.edu Hein, E. (2018). Reharmonization and recontextualization in Kanye West’s “Famous.” Journal of Popular Music Education, 2(1–​2), 101–​114. Read, C. (2016). Top 20 most sampled breakbeats: 2016 update. whosampled.com/​news/​2016/​ 12/​06/​top-​20-​most-​sampled-​breakbeats-​2016-​update/​

9.9. The Final Project 9.9.1. Project Duration Two weeks, including time outside of class.

9.9.2.  Goals • Students will develop their projects based on their own creative vision. • Students will synthesize multiple techniques learned inside or outside of class to realize their vision. • Students will begin to develop their own voices as artists.

9.9.3. Project Design This project is designed as a summary of the entire course and as a capstone to the previous projects. At this point, the class will have a mastered a range of techniques and styles, and they are ready to be set loose on their own ideas. But what, exactly, should the final project look like? It is easier to define the things you do not want from students than to define the things you do want. If the goal is to get students to make something of their own, then you do not want to hear their recordings of other people’s music, or music they downloaded from YouTube, or an unimaginative cover song over a karaoke track. The troubleshooting discussion of the project goes into detail about how to forestall problematic project ideas. In general, it is best for students to avoid: • Relying on prerecorded loops. (Provide guidelines like “Only 50% of the project can be loops” or “Loops are okay as long as they are processed beyond recognition.”) • Karaoke backing tracks. • Throwing a MIDI file of a famous song into the timeline and calling it a day. • Long samples (e.g., the entire chorus of a song). • Relying on other people to provide a significant portion of the project. • Redoing an earlier project.2 Other than that, the sky is the limit. The student wants to include a video? No problem. The student wants to record their rock band playing a song? Great. They want to create an original techno track? Perfect.

2 There is plenty of value in having students revise their work, especially if they go back to earlier projects once they have more confidence and technical skill. Ethan does a self-​remix project late in each semester for exactly this purpose. However, we prefer that the final project be something new.

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9.9.4. Day-​by-​Day Plan 9.9.4.1. Sessions 1 to 2: Introduction and Brainstorming

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On the first day, pull up a calendar and show the two weeks between now and the due date. Then talk students through the final project’s guidelines as explained in the Project Design section above. Some students will appear excited about the prospect of finally getting to design their own project, while others will look like a deer caught in headlights. For younger students, this may be the most independent project they have ever had to complete. There will be other students who excel at the “game of school” and who succeed by precisely executing their teachers’ instructions. By asking them to set their own instructions, you are sending them into uncharted territory, and this can cause them real distress. You will need both to encourage them to push outside their comfort zone and to inspire them by giving them plenty of appealing options. You can begin by playing previous classes’ final projects. Will breaks them into two main categories, originals and covers. Originals may be inspired by an existing piece of music, but are mostly created from scratch. Covers can include literal cover versions, but may also be arrangements, reinterpretations, remixes, reworkings, or parodies. We don’t believe that originals are necessarily better than covers. Every year, we have singer-​songwriters who turn in unimaginative “originals” about breakups sung over generic ukulele chords, and every year we are treated to wildly imaginative takes on existing songs. Here is a list of our “greatest hits” list of especially inspired projects from each category. Originals • A backing track that a sax player created for himself to blow over. • A creepy ambient soundscape depicting someone falling into a black hole. • A Radiohead-​inspired original guitar-​and-​MIDI-​drums track that started as a cover but became its own thing when the student realized he couldn’t sing the high notes. • An original ukulele-​and-​voice song with unique ethereal voice processing and curated visuals. • A bluegrass band that recorded in Will’s studio, with extremely twangy country vocals. • An original chiptune-​style song set to visuals from a video game, complete with sound effects. • An original drum and bass track set to a video of two students on a green screen fighting in a style that looked like Dragonball Z—​Will said this would be too hard to pull off in two weeks, and he was happy to be proven wrong. • A generative song “written” by a Max for Live patch—​the student played the track to moderate applause and then “pulled back the curtain” to reveal the patch. Covers • A Lizzo song rewritten to complain about music theory finals. • An all-​MIDI rework of “Youth” by Daughter (2013) with self-​recorded vocals. • A four-​panel video of a student who recorded every note on the trombone and then manually edited them together into the Super Mario Bros theme song—​another example of something Will was skeptical about, only to be proved wrong.

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• A dubstep remix of “Let it Go” from Frozen (2013) titled “Frostep,” because sometimes you just have to get an idea like this out of your system. • A classical arrangement of a pop song, using a variety of sourced and re-​recorded MIDI parts. • An elaborate remix of an anime theme song with additional keyboard solos. Once students have heard several examples of past final projects, have them open a new DAW session, save the file as “Final Project,” and start to wrestle with the blank page. Over the next week, they will be locking in their ideas. 9.9.4.2. Sessions 3 to 5: Conferences After getting the project started, take time to speak individually with each student about their project idea. This is your opportunity to solidify good ideas and to redirect weak or implausible ones. Several students will always say they don’t know what to do. Ask leading questions: “What was your favorite project we did?” “What project did you feel was the easiest for you?” Help the student personalize that project and make their own. This might be as simple as redoing the movie soundtrack project (Chapter 7.7) with a clip that no one has seen yet, or syncing a new acapella and remixing it. Either way, the student now sees an achievable project that is related to a positive experience, which is always a good starting point for creativity. While some students will have trouble coming up with any ideas, others will have too many: “I want to make a remix of my twelve favorite female pop artists!” “I want to make a mix that tells the entire history of hip-​hop!” These projects rarely succeed. At best, they sound like an overly jumpy mix that the cheerleading team might use, and at worst, they sound like flipping channels on the radio. Help these students to narrow their focus. Some students will have already proved their skills in your class and can be trusted to forge ahead without much guidance. They still need to feel like you understand their goals, and they are usually receptive to enthusiasm about whatever it is they are working to create. Sometimes they will say, “I’m making an original song on the Push,” and they just need some probing: “What kind of song? What’s the vibe you’re going for? What kinds of things have you been listening to that might be in the back of your head while you’re writing?” The main goal is to balance being a guide with maintaining the students’ independence. You can frame advice as questions: “Oh, you want this to sound like Flume? Okay, what if you tried to do the sidechain EQ effect, and did the hi-​hats like this?” When you demonstrate your ability to deconstruct students’ reference tracks, it will fuel their enthusiasm and boost your credibility at the same time. 9.9.4.3. Sessions 6 to 10: Independent Work If everyone is pointed in the right direction after conferences, then the second week of work should be smooth sailing. You have three main jobs this week: to facilitate, to manage expectations, and to give feedback. Examples of facilitating are: • Loaning out specific equipment a student might need for their project (field recording devices, USB microphones, larger MIDI controllers for students who need to play piano parts, etc.).

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• Arranging a schedule for small groups or individuals to use studio space. • Helping find free plugins or sample instruments to help students produce the specific sound they’re aiming for. Examples of managing expectations are: • Talking students through changes to their project idea—​sometimes a change in direction is an important part of the creative process. • Helping to simplify an idea that isn’t progressing as planned. • Pushing students who are “finished early” to extend the length or complexity of their project.

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Giving feedback can include simply checking in to listen to projects and encouraging students to seek a second set of ears before they decide that their track is finished. 9.9.4.4. Final Showcase We treat the final showcase as a long open listening session. Each student briefly describes what they chose to do for their final project, and then the group listens as usual. Since these projects are more personal, it’s important to maintain a supportive atmosphere. You may also prefer to do an asynchronous showcase by having students post their work on Bandcamp, SoundCloud, or YouTube, and then have the class listen to each other’s projects online. Some teachers host a “gallery walk,” where each final project is on a listening station and the listeners are invited to move through at their own pace. The final project is also a natural reason to throw a big public-​facing event, featuring DJ sets or live performances of students’ music synchronized to visuals. This more concertlike environment may not appeal to all students, but if a group has previous performance experience or interest, it can be a great fit.

9.9.5.  Troubleshooting Some students inevitably have trouble deciding what to do. This will manifest as several days of distraction or inertia. You will need to suggest a simple starting point: “Why don’t you just do a loops project and see where it goes from there?” Eventually, you may be able to help give the project a more personal touch, but for now, this gets them creating something and making initial decisions. You can then build on the decisions together. Students using pre-​existing guide tracks will need assistance synchronizing and warping tracks and/​or importing MIDI tracks. They will also need some guidance on how much of this material to keep in their project and how much to leave out. (See the custom cover song project in Chapter 7.6.) These are also the same students who are likely to ask for access to bigger keyboards, better microphones, instrument interfaces, and, most importantly, extra time and/​or privacy to record vocals. Make sure to cater to them, because the most ambitious projects often turn out to be the most memorable. When projects are getting close to completion, make sure you know how to move session files from one computer to another, with all linked files included. Some programs

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like GarageBand include all relevant project files within the session file itself (since the “file” is actually a folder3). Others, like Ableton Live, do not do this by default. Practice moving projects between computers yourself to identify the common issues that can arise. This skill is also useful if you ever need to move students to another seat for behavior reasons!

9.9.6. During Work Time It’s important to be available and to be alert for spotting problems, but not overly intrusive. Early-​stage ideas are like fragile soap bubbles—​easily popped if you interrupt or intervene too fast. Instead, you can engage the group as a whole by sharing common tips, reminding them about features or techniques they may have forgotten, or simply encouraging them to ask for feedback. Be careful that, when you suggest your own ideas, you aren’t derailing a student’s productive line of thought. Teenagers are not confident and independent creatives yet, and they are still inclined to defer to you as the expert authority figure. If a teacher suggests that they change their project idea, the startling truth is that they most often will listen and do it. College students are more resistant to authority, but the same caution still applies. If a student chooses your idea over their own because they think you will like the result better, this would be a step backward in their creative development. Only suggest major changes in direction if you are certain that the student’s idea will not work. Even then, remember the Prime Directive and exercise humility. Not every impractical or implausible idea is a bad one. To adapt a quote from Arthur C. Clarke: When a distinguished but elderly musician states that something is possible, they are almost certainly right. When they state that something is impossible, they are very probably wrong.

9.9.7. Assessment Strategies An open-​concept project like this one is the most difficult type of project to grade. How would you compare projects on an apples-​to-​apples basis when the projects are so different in concept and execution? To answer this, consider the initial goals of the project: • Students create something of their own design. • The material should be mostly newly created, rather than pre-​existing. • The project should not simply be a copy of an older one. If a student makes an earnest effort at their ability level and the output sounds genuinely like the level of work this student is capable of, give them a high score. Grading effort rather than outcome (while not necessarily advertising you’re doing so) is key to keeping the work honest and genuine. But how do you know whether the work is genuine? Many teachers ask for project files to be turned in with projects. However, this presents some unavoidable technical challenges. Even professionals don’t always collect their project files correctly! An alternative is to have students turn in screenshots of their work. Even this will not prevent

3 Note that, because GarageBand files are folders, you will not be able to email them or upload them to Google Drive unless you compress them to zip files first.

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an especially crafty kid from grabbing an obscure remix off Soundcloud, adding silent but visible drum tracks, and re-​exporting the file as their own work. One of Will’s students actually did this. The project was surprisingly (but not impossibly) well executed, and Will bragged to other people about how good his students were . . . until someone pointed out that they had heard that remix before. From that point on, he decided to Shazam every project that sounded a little too good to be true. Shazam is an effective and silent way to verify that a great project is actually great, and the rare and humiliating occasion when you choose to publicly point out work that’s not genuine will become a cautionary tale for generations to come. In all seriousness, the final project is about celebrating students as they push outside their comfort zone and create something they never thought they could create. Ideally, they will take the opportunity to express something in their own authentic voice. If the final project encourages creative risk taking, you should consider it a success.

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10.1. Weak Student Engagement I designed a lesson around a music concept or trend, and students either can’t quite pull it off, or, even worse, they aren’t interested in completing the project. A principal once told Will that for any student activity to work, the student has to both have fun and feel successful. If only one of those happens, the activity (or club, or sport, or, in this case, a winter percussion ensemble) will simply not work. Many projects teach a technique but omit satisfying elements that make the project fun to return to each day. Take, for example, a project that teaches how a drum machine works. Most teachers would include instructions on how to make a drum-​set-​style beat, with backbeats on the snare drum, grooves on the kick drum, and fill-​in patterns on the hi-​hat. This might be enough for some students, because learning a drum machine is not something you get to do in other classes. But for students who were not interested in learning how drumbeats work in the first place, what could make it more engaging? In this case, we like to show students how to substitute found sounds for elements of the drum kits. This lets students customize their projects to their hearts’ content while still learning beats. Maybe a whip-​crack sounds great instead of the stock clap sound. Maybe a fart noise works for a kick—​there’s no need to take it too seriously! Build some customization into every project—​your students will be better motivated to put their own spin on it, and they will be more engaged in the technical elements you’re trying to teach.

10.2. Projects Take Too Long I pace my lessons appropriately, but students never seem to finish when I think they should. Students who are ahead end up waiting for the slower students to finish before we can move onto the next project. Many projects in this book are designed with incremental steps at the beginning stage, followed by more open-​ended customization and exploration time, and concluding with a finishing stage. It can be difficult to get some students past the customization stage, but there are a few strategies you can try that will help move projects over the finish line.

Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0010

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10.2.1. Strategy One: Real Artists Ship We discourage the romantic myth of the tortured artist waiting for inspiration. We think of finishing creative work as a skill unto itself, one that can be practiced and learned. Once students experience pushing a few projects to completion and letting go of them, they discover that it is habit-​forming. It is not necessary for a finished track to be the most perfect execution of the idea; instead, it represents its creator’s state of mind and abilities at that moment.1 You can further reduce the pressure by doing a self-​remix project late in the course, where students rework one of their earlier tracks.

10.2.2. Strategy Two: More One-​on-​One Help

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If students are hesitant to record or export their projects, they may need a stronger second opinion. Taking care not to violate the Prime Directive (Chapter 6.11), ask to listen to the project and offer suggestions. If there is a glaring technical problem, feel free to simply step in and fix it. It is not necessarily intrusive to try to interpret what the student intended to make, and then to help them see how to do it with a working example.

10.2.3. Strategy Three: Pencils Down This is the most forceful strategy, and it may cause more anxiety than it removes, but if too many students are struggling with a project, do not be afraid to call it a day and force a turn-​in. We have each had some projects crash land the first time through, only to go on to become reliable successes with a little tweaking. Hard deadlines exist in the real world, and just handing in something is usually better than giving up completely. Allan Tucker, a wise mastering engineer, told Ethan in grad school that mixes are never completed, just abandoned. Sometimes leaving a project in the rearview mirror against your will is a necessary and valuable part of the creative process. To paraphrase Steve Jobs, you should be just as proud of the songs you didn’t release as the ones you did release.

10.3. Projects End Too Quickly Students seem to rush through projects just to get them done. I try to get them to take the time and care to make the project personal, but they seem to only be interested in completing their work quickly. If students are rushing through projects, this may be a symptom of extrinsic motivation—​ they are more concerned with being rewarded by an authority figure (or with avoiding punishment) than they are with making good music. Rushing may also be a sign that the project is too simple, that it’s too technical and not creative enough, or that it doesn’t provide enough scaffolding before the customization phase. To make sure the projects can’t end quickly, Will suggests that early-​stage lessons focus on a specific technique, and that students then practice that technique in the course of building up raw material. For example, you might demonstrate drum programming, 1 This mindset is also helpful when finishing book manuscripts.

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and then have students practice by generating many drum patterns. Most of these will end up unused, which is fine. If you don’t set a maximum amount of raw material, you can support greater differentiation. While your beginners are struggling to create three or four patterns, your advanced students can stay engaged by generating twelve or fifteen patterns, giving them more material to work with. You can avoid the extrinsic motivation problem by de-​emphasizing grades. Schools require grades, but real life does not. Creating music in the outside world can bring you joy, sadness, satisfaction, regret, and many other emotions. It will usually not bring you a neat evaluative summary of your effort. Any external reward (money, fame, critical praise, and so on) will be only tenuously related to your effort in the studio. We use grades as an incentive to make sure students complete the projects and turn them in. If they meet the minimal project requirements, we give full credit, regardless of the quality of the resulting music. We use the comments attached to the grade to give more nuanced and personal feedback, and to encourage the student to keep working at the technical requirements while striving to find their own voice.

10.4. Students Are Afraid to Show Their Projects Students seem to be able to turn in projects, but they panic if I want to play them out loud. Even worse, students are reluctant to even submit their projects because they are afraid I’ll play them out loud. There are many strong opinions on this topic from all types of lab-​based music teachers. We believe that students aren’t afraid of hearing their song out loud; they’re afraid of being judged by their peers. Our solution is to establish the most non-​judgmental environment that we can. Will explains that his classes should listen to each other’s projects so students can hear their peers’ approaches and interpretations. In a lab-​based class, it is only practical to do this in a group listening session. In an art class, you can look around the room and see everyone else’s work, but in a lab where everyone is using headphones, this kind of casual sharing is impossible. Students might well get inspiration during a listening session that they can apply to their next project. It is crucial that you set the tone for peer comments. Ethan models a growth-​oriented tone by giving ideas for how a track might develop further, rather than assessing whether it is “good” or not. He asks, “If you were handed this track and asked to push it to the next level, what would you do?” You can ask this question of both rudimentary beginner-​level work and the most sophisticated advanced projects. We model applauding after listening to each project, whether we liked the track or not, because we are rewarding effort and risk-​taking, not outcomes. You should of course avoid being excessively negative in judgments. But it is also important to tread lightly with praise, because positive judgment is still judgment. Even if a project is absolutely flawless, you can always invite a discussion about how it might grow. Could the student write lyrics? Use it in a film or a game? Remix it in a different style? Playing a great-​sounding track is reward enough; there is no need to implicitly judge less successful students by overpraising the successful ones. Everyone gets applause and a respectful hearing.

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Finally, if a student is truly terrified to share their project, Will allows them to save face by simply saying they found a problem and are in the process of updating the file. Ethan lets them push their presentations back a week, no questions asked. If you don’t put people on the spot unnecessarily, they will feel less anxious about being judged.

10.5. I Can’t Think of Ideas for Projects I’m a qualified teacher who has been trained in music education. I know a lot about music, and I know a lot about teaching, but I can’t seem to create project-​based lessons that challenge the students.

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This is perhaps the most difficult challenge in the music lab program. As described in Chapter 6.6, creating great projects isn’t just about relaying a musical skill to your class. It’s about “keeping your ear to the streets” and actively learning what students might want to make. Sometimes projects emerge from the tools at hand—​students who see a demonstration of Push will naturally want to try it themselves. However, it is easy to fall into the trap of teaching procedural technical skills without connecting them to the broader musical culture. If you want students to create personal and interesting music, it will need to emerge from a conversation between your experience and the new ideas that students bring into the room. We like to use genres as the buffer between technical training and personal musical ideas. When we walk students through an iconic track in a particular style, the goal is to empower them to create music in that style. We want to equip them with enough technical know-​how to work independently, and enough cultural vocabulary to be able to describe their ideas. The more authentic musical variety you can introduce into your lessons, the more the students will be interested in sharing their own ideas. You might imagine that presenting the specifics of a particular style impedes students’ creativity, but we have found the opposite to be true: their creativity flourishes within the constraints of specific real-​world styles.

10.6. Staying Relevant I feel out of touch with music trends. I want to engage the students with current styles, but when trying to make my own tracks, I feel inauthentic, or, worse, the students laugh at my out-​of-​date examples. We dread waking up one day to realize that all of our ideas are outdated, that our most loyal students have been misguided by our enthusiasm for irrelevant material, and that other (probably cooler) students are out there making fun of the music our students are making. To some extent, this has already happened. We are middle-​aged dads. Will lives and works in Lebanon, Ohio, where his students inevitably experience trends second-​hand. Things that are cool in LA, New York, and Berlin today might trickle down to Lebanon years later, probably far removed from their original context. Ethan faces a different challenge; he teaches in New York City, where his students are themselves the ones driving the trends. Keeping up with their expectations is a relentless challenge. The most terrifying sentence he has ever heard is “Mister Ethan, we want to hear you rap!”

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Fortunately, we have a solution. We think of ourselves and our students as amateurs. We are enthusiasts, not experts. We make no promises of fame or fortune, or even that anyone outside of our classroom will enjoy what we make. Sister Corita Kent wrote a maxim often repeated by John Cage: “There is no win and no fail, there is only make.” That said, we are thin-​skinned authoritarians at heart, and we don’t enjoy being mocked. Here are a few secret tips for success for staying on top of music trends: • Find the trendsetters. These students have more refined music taste than the average student, and maybe not in the way you like. Find them and make them trust you enough to share their music opinions. • As they share, figure out where they are getting their music opinions from. For example, Will might read Pitchfork reviews, but if his students all trust Anthony Fantano’s reviews instead, he should also be paying attention to those. • Remember your angst-​ridden teenage years? If a song is too popular, distrust it a bit, and look for students who are doing the same. • Design some projects around sampling and remixing to see where trends are going. If many students are sampling something, look into it and try to see how it’s made. If it’s interesting enough, maybe make some of the styles into genre projects—​this will earn you more trust from the trendsetters. • Create an afterschool club (see Chapter 13) with music enthusiasts at the helm and have them make seasonal playlists that they share with each other, and with you. • If you learn the artists and jargon for the music your students like, they will be more inclined to share with you. • Have students create their own DJ sets. • Share your music less, and share their music more.

10.7. I Went to School for Music. How (or Why) Should I Manage a Computer Class? I was trained in managing 80-​person choir classes or in writing marching drill, but managing a computer lab feels intimidating or impossible. This is really where the work is, at least at the beginning of your career teaching technology-​ based music classes. First of all, do not accept the current state of affairs in your lab setting. Your lab is your classroom, and you need to manage it in a way that works for you and your students. If the room is set up in a way that makes it hard to function, or it does not have the gear you need, then it is up to you to find a way to change it. Of course, in the real world, things are not always so simple. Maybe your IT department has strict rules governing computer purchases or accessing individual student accounts. Maybe your principal wants some equipment put away or locked up at night. Work around these external factors as best you can, keeping individual student experience as your first priority. Sit down at each student station and use the computer. Is it easy to find the software? Does it feel inviting? What does the station feel like? Is it roomy or cramped? Are there wires everywhere? Is the main interface for playing music clean and ready to use, or is it tucked away and inaccessible?

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Now walk into an Apple store (or another well-​run tech retailer) and use the computers there. How is the experience different? What have they done to the computers to make sure they work for the hundreds of users they have each day? Can you mess up the computers, or do they revert back to a functional state every so often? Are some apps already launched for you so you don’t have to find them? Where is play encouraged, and what functions are disabled? Asking these questions is the first step toward managing your own technology space. (Specific hardware and software considerations are discussed in Chapter 4.)

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My students feel that I move too fast. They are confused by my expectations, but they are hesitant to tell me. Projects take longer than I think they should. I find myself in a position of catching up students by trying to do portions of their project for them, or, worse, I give up on them. Congratulations! You are officially “good” at music technology. Your demos dazzle and your example tracks have a following on SoundCloud. But your students simply can’t keep up, and they dismiss your lessons as “They can do that, but I can’t.” Like so many professional drummers on VHS giving detailed “tutorials” where they “teach” you how to be an amazing musician by performing dazzling drum solos, your demos may be more impressive and entertaining than educational. A good start to fixing this pacing problem is to break your steps down into smaller instructions and to spot check students often. Once you feel confident that the class is following you, try grouping steps into larger instructions with larger amounts of time for work. Do students seem lost again? Step backward. Develop a rule of thumb regarding how long something takes you and how long it takes for students. (For Will, one hour for him equals three hours for them.) You can also use this rule of thumb to simplify projects that might be too complicated or open-​ended. As you progress in developing your curriculum, some of these challenges may strike harder than others. We encourage you to constantly reflect on your programming and your materials, and to refine them bit by bit until each project serves a purpose for your student population. As your program becomes more refined, commit to retiring or reworking at least one project per year. The musical skills may not change much from year to year, but styles constantly move forward –​move with them, and your students will have an excellent experience.

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As teachers, we often conflate the term “assessment” with “testing” or “grades.” Yet, we do not want students to write music specifically for the purpose of getting points; this attitude is not compatible with creative risk-​taking. If music tech is not a required class, students getting bad grades would have had a better experience not taking the class in the first place. They certainly will not encourage their friends to take the class next year. In our classes, we have no expectations of prior knowledge, and no standardized test to teach to. While we hope that our students use the techniques and ideas they learn in their musical lives going forward, we are not trying to create professional producers. What, then, are grades for? In our opinion, they serve two purposes: getting students to do the projects, and giving us an excuse to give comments. We do not want students to think about their grade as they bounce their final mixdown; we want them to feel proud of what they created, and to be excited to move onto the next project.

11.1. Intrinsic Motivation Intrinsic motivation comes from within, from an authentic personal desire to attain mastery. All young children feel intrinsic motivation to experience music, but this motivation rarely survives the music classroom (Renwick & Reeve, 2012, p. 145). When teachers use evaluation as a threat or as a way to stoke competition between students, it might succeed in making them compliant, but it undermines their intrinsic motivation. Teachers can use assessments to support intrinsic motivation by using noncontrolling and informational language, and by encouraging students to take responsibility for their own learning. We both strive to reward students for effort more than outcomes, because we want them to feel secure that they can take musical risks, even if their reach exceeds their grasp. Students will be self-​critical regardless, especially when you play back their projects for their peers, and intrinsic motivation is more effective than fear of bad grades. Feedback for creative work should use a growth mindset (Dweck, 2006), rewarding effort and intent over polished execution. Scores and letter grades are blunt instruments for this purpose. It is better to give verbal commentary and feedback. Students take suggestions from the critiques seriously, in a way that they don’t always take the rest of the class. Ethan has students who fail to retain technical information from one week to the next,

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but who will reference a casual comment he made months earlier about how they should have longer sections in their tracks.

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The most important skill we can teach creative music makers is critical listening. Immediate feedback is key to sustaining a state of creative flow (Custodero, 2002). No teacher can provide immediate feedback to 30 students at a time, but we can teach them to provide it to themselves, by listening carefully to their own work. You can model the kind of close listening you want students to be able to do for themselves. It is especially important for teachers of creative lab classes to practice self-​critical listening, because it is a gap in other forms of music education. In director-​led ensembles, the judgments of the director matter more than the opinions of the ensemble. When Ethan teaches performance majors, they often tell him that they have never been asked for their opinions on their music before. There is no way to objectively assess creative work, and we do not want to grade students’ tracks based on whether they align without our own tastes. Instead, we want to find out what the student’s musical goal was. Then we can help them determine how to build on what they have and to move closer to that goal. Whatever state the track is in, what will take it to the next level? If the project is a complete mess, what steps might begin to pull it together? If it’s a good idea that is poorly executed, how could it be smoothed out? If it’s a promising fragment, how could it be developed into a full thought? And if it’s a complete and polished track, could it have lyrics, or another section, or an alternative arrangement? Sometimes, the solution is obvious. Maybe the student has a clear goal in mind, and they just don’t know how to get there. Maybe they want to make a bumping club track but the drum sounds are weak. Maybe their project contains a few good ideas that are strung together without any particular structure. It is easy to provide solutions for these problems. Often, however, a student will have no particular goal beyond completing the assignment. In that case, feedback will need to be more creative. Peer feedback is excellent for this purpose. Ethan likes to ask: If this track is a film or game score, what’s happening in the scene/​level? Students have a lot of implicit knowledge in this area from their own media consumption, so they give specific and unexpected answers: “It’s a happy caterpillar doing a dance,” or “It’s a bar fight in a domed underwater city.” This makes it possible to figure out how the track could more strongly convey the feeling of a happy dancing caterpillar or a bar fight in a domed underwater city.

11.3. Practical Considerations Your local school board may not share our liberal philosophy of assessment. Some schools require their teachers to give several grades per week. If you need to do this, you can use reflections, quizzes, and other types of written work to address these needs. Ethan has students create written documentation of their process, in which they explain the sounds and techniques they used, why they used them, and what improvements they would make if they had unlimited time and technical ability. Whatever assessment methods you use, everything should be secondary to, and in support of, the music projects.

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Figure 11.1 Music tech project check-​in sheet with grading rubric.

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Will has created a rubric for grading projects that is designed to provide accurate accounting of students’ progress while rewarding them for having taken the risk to enroll in the class in the first place. His goal with the rubric is to satisfy school requirements, taking into account the wide range of ability levels that students bring to a project-​based open-​enrollment class. Figure 11.1 shows the music tech project check-​in sheet and the grading rubric. If students are attempting to turn in complete projects, they will probably score in the Emerging to Skillful boxes, which nets them an A in the course.1 We also recommend that you set aside a session every so often for students to listen to each other’s projects. Set out ground rules ahead of time. It asks a lot of teenagers to have them share their work with their peers, so Will restricts feedback to applause, and neither positive nor negative comments are allowed. Ethan teaches college students, who are more self-​confident, so he invites gentle and constructive peer critique.

References Custodero, L. A. (2002). Seeking challenge, finding skill: Flow experience and music education. Arts Education Policy Review, 103(3), 3–​9. Dweck, C. (2006). Mindset: The new psychology of success. Random House. Renwick, J., & Reeve, J. M. (2012). Supporting motivation in music education. In G. E. McPherson & G. F. Welch (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of music education (Vol. 1, pp. 144–​162). Oxford University Press.

1 The version shown in Figure 11.1 was designed as a paper turn-​in sheet, but you may prefer to fill it out electronically.

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Teachers are often concerned about how to keep their electronic music school current. If a new music class or program is based on trendy, currently relevant pop culture, how will that program maintain its relevance ten or twenty years from now? The advantage of canonical or historical music is that it doesn’t change from year to year, or even decade to decade. Dance music and hip-​hop change constantly. It is easy to feel overwhelmed. Hip-​hop culture offers a solution: the concept of “freshness.” The word is one of uncountably many synonyms for “cool,” but it means something more specific. Freshness is a “state of constant evolution and renewal to not only be fresh, but stay fresh” (Kruse, 2016, p. 56, emphases in original). Freshness and newness often go together, but they are not the same thing. The hip-​hop usage of “fresh” could be referencing any of the original senses of the word: new; refreshing, as in “fresh water”; appetizing, as in “fresh produce”; attractive, as in “fresh-​faced”; or uncouth, as in the expression “don’t get fresh” (Hein, 2015). Valuing freshness stands in direct opposition to valuing an official and unchanging canon. It also encourages irreverence and a continual and vigilant criticism. Being fresh doesn’t mean always chasing current trends. It means keeping an awareness of them, and balancing that awareness against a set of core values.

12.1. Refreshing Old Projects Current students don’t like projects that were really popular with former students. I didn’t change how I’m teaching—​what changed? Sometimes the issue has nothing to do with your teaching or lesson delivery and everything to do with your lack of awareness of the culture surrounding the project. Young people are keenly aware of their peers’ judgments and how the shifting currents of pop culture affect them. Cultural trends may force you to retire otherwise educationally valid projects. That doesn’t mean that your effort was wasted, though. Here are two strategies for keeping things fresh.

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12.1.1. Strategy 1: Update the Elements of a Project That Involves Choices You may naturally want to keep your loop libraries and folders of acapella tracks current up to the minute. However, this approach can backfire if you look like you are trying too hard to please fickle teenagers with your “cool” music choices. Instead, hedge your bets: mix together some old and some new, some mainstream choices and some alternative ones. Rather than choosing musical materials based on their trendiness, choose the ones that you know will work well for a given project or purpose. See which ones students gravitate toward and which ones they ignore. Include a few “Easter eggs” that students of discriminating taste might be attracted to. Ethan always includes a few Björk examples, because while not everyone loves (or has heard of) her, the people who do love her are thrilled to encounter her in class. Another way to update elements year after year is to include the advanced students in the process. They probably remember what it was like to take that first introductory class, what was exciting, and what felt forced. You reap two benefits from including students in these decisions: you get suggestions that you might not have thought of, and you build a tighter trust relationship with a core constituency.

12.1.2. Strategy 2: Acknowledge Defeat and Make Fun of Your Past Self This strategy can work well if you have a new project ready to replace an old project while retaining some of the old project’s technical or creative goals, and if there is a way to reframe the old project in historical terms. For example, Will started doing a dubstep project in 2012. At the time, dubstep was relevant among tastemakers and was rising in mainstream popularity. By 2015, the genre had peaked in popularity and the novelty had worn off, but Will was still teaching the project. At first, he attempted to reframe the project as a fun throwback, but then he realized that it was time to retire it. In order to replace it, Will looked at where the genre had drifted. Former dubstep producers briefly flirted with trap, but then they began creating a different genre that some refer to as future bass. This style shares elements with dubstep, and conveniently shares its lineage of producers as well. Will retained the historical aspects of the dubstep presentation as a lead-​in for a future bass project (see Chapter 8.9). Projects based on currently popular genres are great for cultural relevance, but they will always have a built-​in shelf life. The good news is that once a genre has become fondly retro, it never goes out of style. You can “diversify your portfolio” by combining trendy forward-​thinking genres (vaporwave, future bass), self-​consciously retro genres that remain relevant in the present (boom-​bap, drum & bass, chiptune), and non-​time-​specific genres that adapt well to any current trend (house, trap).

12.2. Outlasting a Graduating Class Activities designed for some of my best students tend to collapse once those students leave or graduate. What if, next year, students are just not into electronic music?

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Electronic music is not a genre, any more than guitar music or vocal music are. Electronic music is a set of sounds and techniques that can be applied in a variety of stylistic contexts. Some students do not, and never will, like techno or house or hip-​hop. (We sometimes encounter classical music performance majors who make a show of not listening to any current music at all.) You do not have to be interested in or knowledgeable about electronic music styles to be good at creating within them. Newcomers to electronic music can sometimes be the most enthusiastic producers. We didn’t become truly passionate about electronic music until we tried creating it; you may find the same to be true of some of your students (and of yourself). In Will’s first few years running the Electronic Music Group (EMG; Chapter 13), he was blessed with a tight group of engaged dance music enthusiasts. Some of them DJ’d on the side and maintained personal SoundCloud profiles where they posted their beats and recordings. It was easy to say, “Hey, remix this track” and expect a high-​quality result with minimal work on Will’s part. Then this cohort graduated, leaving him with a group of students who were far more into new wave folk music like Mumford & Sons. The EMG was not yet well adapted to change, and Will worried that it might not be a sustainable activity. Will realized that he had been relying on a few advanced students and neglecting the younger beginners. He had no clear pipeline for recruiting more future experts. Fortunately, he was able to identify a new cohort and rebooted the group. From then, he prioritized sustainability, and he and his students designed the program with that in mind. Beyond the students’ musical talent, the success of the EMG also hinged on their sense of independence as musicians and their seriousness about their own tastes and sensibilities. EMG has now evolved through several phases. Some versions of the group include rap, some focus on cover songs, some are more oriented toward DJ’ing, and some years are more mainstream or more experimental. Recruiting has stabilized enough to accommodate a wide variety of tastes and styles of music, and the group’s framework is optimized for the independence of its members, rather than for any specific genre.

12.3. Maintaining Skills Between Old and New Projects I’m going to need to retire a project—​how can I keep teaching the skill that the project focused on? In popular music, styles come and go like the weather. However, there are some musical constants: metronomic tempos, syncopated rhythms, static harmonies, complex sound design, and the guiding aesthetics of the African diaspora. Whatever styles your students are listening to, there will be aesthetic and technological continuity with what came before. Consider the history of Antares Auto-​Tune. This trendy vocal plug-​in is based on signal-​processing algorithms that date back almost a century. Students are always fascinated to find out that current rap hits share a lineage with their own cell phones’ audio encoders, with Daft Punk’s “Harder Better Faster Stronger” (2001), with Herbie Hancock’s “Rockit” (1983), with Peter Frampton’s “Do You Feel Like We Do” (1973), with

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the talking train whistle in Dumbo (1941), and with the room-​sized Bell Labs vocoder that Franklin Delano Roosevelt used for encrypted conversations with Winston Churchill during World War II (Tompkins, 2011). In the vaporwave project (see Chapter 9.6), we discuss using gated reverb on drum tracks. This technique emerged from 1980s progressive and new wave rock, but it keeps popping up in more current styles, so students are more receptive to hearing about its history. By contrast, if we tried to present gated reverb as a way to recreate the sound of Genesis or The Police, we would appear out of touch. As we write this, vaporwave is itself receding into the cultural past, but gated reverb will no doubt reappear in some other style, and then vaporwave will be another layer of historical context for it. The old PBS show Connections had an episode on the development of the Saturn V rocket, and the show connected the invention of rocket fuel all the way back to the pike square formations used in French armies as early as the 9th century. Will remembers thinking about how he would never have wanted to learn about pike squares were it not for the show’s billing itself as being about spaceships. Music production lessons are like this. A new technique from a new artist can often be traced backward rather than forward. Make the connections, and your curriculum can remain fresh year after year.

12.4. Adapting to New Teaching Formats I want to adapt my material to a different teaching format but am not sure how it will work. Let’s say that you want to work with small groups instead of large classes, or that you want to increase participation in large-​group classes. Or maybe you have to move all your content online in a hurry in response to a worldwide pandemic.1 Should you keep teaching the projects as they are, or do they only work in their original setting? Your classes will change over time, there is no question about that. Student demographics will change, or you’ll be assigned to teach a different age group, or a crisis like the 2020 pandemic will come along and throw your entire format out the window. Even without such a disaster, few teachers make it through an entire career without having to adapt to new circumstances. The revolutionary music teacher remains optimistic, because a crisis is also an opportunity. The question is not, “Will things change?” Be assured that they will! A better question is, “How will I change things?” Imagine curricula on a continuum ranging from personalized to prescribed. If you find yourself teaching fewer students at a time, you can adapt your projects to become more personalized to the individual student. You can tailor the drumbeats project to a specific genre that a student is interested in learning first, or a multimedia project can use videos that students have already made. On the prescribed end, consider making projects delivered in a general way. Big groups need common checkpoints and manageable workloads across a variety of skill levels. The beginning projects in this book presume a class of 30 students with rigid class starting and ending dates. As many professional music educators know, when you are teaching private lessons, the pacing flows differently from student to student, and one of the hardest aspects of larger group teaching is pacing for everyone at once. 1 Hypothetically.

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If you need to move to an online format, you will face the challenge of equipment and software accessibility. Earlier in the book, we define an ideal workspace, and students’ homes are very far from ideal. However, private music production teachers can have great success teaching online lessons. (Ethan struggled to move his classes online during the pandemic, but his work with private students was largely unaffected.) Online lessons can take the format of a tutorial or even a TV show, like the engaging and well-​produced YouTube channels of Andrew Huang and foreword author Adam Neely. Other online educators prefer to build a tight network of like-​minded users, like the Ableton User Groups, that carry on threads of communication between meetings in online forums. The keys to adapting and creating a thriving online environment are authenticity and communication. Do students want to spend the same amount of time online at home as they would face to face? Usually not, but a similar depth of communication can be had by keeping conversations alive with shorter conference calls and ongoing chats.

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12.5. Committing to a Platform (or Not) I’m worried about committing to a software platform. What if Ableton Live (for example) is no longer made or is no longer popular? Welcome to the technology world, where change is the only constant. You may not even have a choice of software. Universities want to use the same gear as professional studios, because that’s where they are hoping to send their graduates. However, secondary-​level teachers usually have greater freedom. We recommend favoring depth over breadth and focusing your effort on exactly one software platform. (We like Ableton Live, of course, but we aren’t dogmatic about it.) If you try to teach multiple platforms (e.g., starting beginners on GarageBand and then switching advanced students to Ableton Live), it limits the depth that students will be able to reach on either platform. Our motto is, “Find a place worth trusting and try trusting it for a while.” Whether that place is GarageBand, Live, Reason, Pro Tools, Logic Pro, Reaper, FL Studio, Digital Performer, or whatever else, attaining deep expertise will serve you and your students well. Expert users of one platform will have an easier time learning another one, in the same way that a highly skilled guitarist will have an easier time learning to play the piano. As the teacher, you need to know which way the cultural wind is blowing. Do you find that you and your students are “hitting the ceiling” of your chosen platform? (This will happen quickly with GarageBand.) Do you see others doing things your students wish they could do but can’t? It may be time to change. This advice applies to both music hardware and software, not to mention to the computers themselves. There are many ways to stay current with trends in music technology. We recommend following Peter Kirn’s site, Create Digital Music (cdm.link) and reading reviews in Sound on Sound magazine (soundonsound.com) as starting points. You can also participate in online discussion forums like the “I Teach Music Technology” Facebook group, and network with like-​minded individuals through organizations like TI:ME (Technology in Music Education, ti-​me.org), APME (the Association of Popular Music Educators, popularmusiceducation.org), or the Audio Engineering Society (aes.org). Your professional development as a teacher has to include both music education and technology

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education. Stay up to date on the trends in both and you will be well equipped to understand the pros and cons of any particular platform.

References Hein, E. (2015). Mad fresh. NewMusicBox. newmusicbox.org/​articles/​mad-​fresh/​ Kruse, A. J. (2016). Being hip-​hop. General Music Today, 30(1), 53–​58. Tompkins, D. (2011). How to wreck a nice beach: The vocoder from World War II to hip-​hop, the machine speaks. Melville House.

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PART III

Community Music Culture and Extracurriculars Student-​led extracurricular programs are the engine that drives new students into lab-​based classes year after year. Placing students in charge of important public-​facing projects is not typical for school programs. This section takes a deep dive into examples of how these cultural projects work. It devotes significant space to students in Will’s program, who have written guides to pass down to future students, relaying their successes and failures. It also explores ways to adapt to social change, and how the project-​based electronic music approach fits into the broader picture of music education.

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13.1. Preparing Students for a Musical Life Outside of School Our goal as music teachers is for our students to no longer need us. That is, we hope that our students will become advanced enough that they can create, rehearse, and perform music on their own, and more importantly, that they will feel motivated to do so. In The Blues Brothers (1980), Jake and Elwood Blues are on a divinely inspired mission to get the band back together. This is a trope in many other movies. Why, though, is the re-​uniting band never a concert band? Joking aside, we know why there are not too many big amateur ensembles outside of schools. Imagine organizing dozens or hundreds of members without an institutional structure. An orchestra or concert band might not need a leader to practice independently, but they do need one to organize group logistics and to get everyone to show up. This is why there are no “garage choirs,” but there are many garage bands, not to mention bedroom producers, SoundCloud rappers, and countless independent experimental musicians. Jo Saunders (2010, p. 75) called them “disengaged alternative musicians,” and it’s all too common for them to describe their formal music training as an obstacle as much as an inspiration. Our challenge is to promote the creation of independent music groups without forcing them to perform as a class. This is new territory for all of us. How do we provide a nurturing environment for young creatives without taking a heavy-​handed role in their creations? How can we support student-​led groups so that they attain the continuity of membership that traditional school ensembles have? This chapter explores a few examples that aim to inspire you to expand your offerings on the performance stage.

13.2. Model One: Recording Club One strategy is to offer the lab as a welcoming creative environment, where students can record their own projects and bands. Students can take advantage of a better setup than they would have access to in a bedroom or garage to pursue their ideas, free from outside pressure or expectations. Some students will only want to record a free demo Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0013

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for themselves. Others will want to set up mics, run recording sessions, edit and mix, or simply come and hang out. There is a value to this last activity! Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger (1991) described “legitimate peripheral participation” as a key feature of a healthy informal learning community. The recording club strategy requires little more than equipment and word-​of-​ mouth advertising. If you have students who do exceptional classwork, encourage them to book a recording session. Have them invite some friends to watch them record and provide refreshments. Make a casual concert out of it, or leave the students alone if they would rather work in privacy. The only “regulars” at this club might be the technical assistants, or possibly a small band that can rehearse after the sessions are over. Consider releasing recordings produced by the recording club over the course of the year, or at the end of term. You can post tracks to a SoundCloud or Bandcamp profile, or release YouTube videos modeled on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts. If you’re feeling particularly nostalgic, you could even make CDs of the sessions and sell them as a fundraiser. If you are only selling a few dozen copies, you do not need to worry about copyright. If you establish a safe, creative, and (above all) low-​pressure place for students to showcase their talents and apply their tech skills, it will add value to your program while authentically reflecting your students’ strengths and interests.

13.3. Model Two: The House Band Each year that Will runs the recording club at Lebanon High School, he can expect to encounter several singer-​songwriters, solo guitarists, and the occasional pickup ensemble (usually friends who form a one-​time backup band to help out a singer). Ethan designs his music tech projects to be singer-​songwriter friendly. When students collaborate on each other’s original songs, they can form a quick and lasting bond, and this is always exciting to witness. In the second year of Will’s recording club (circa 2010), a group of rappers started booking lots of studio time together, eventually forming a group called Swag Empire. Using the then-​new Odd Future collective as their template, Swag Empire would simply set up a beat and take turns doing verses. These were usually freestyles, but they were sometimes written out. The group also invited singers in to provide hooks. In hip-​hop circles, this kind of group activity is known as a cypher (Ableton, 2019). To see a cypher form organically over the course of a school year was truly special, particularly in a rural high school surrounded by corn fields. While cyphers are more common in New York City, it is still a thrill whenever Ethan gets to witness one in action. A thriving culture of “house bands” can have long-​term effects. The Cincinnati native band Harbour began its life in Lebanon High School’s recording club as two groups: Harmon and Low With the Flow. Harmon played several local shows and adopted a pop-​punk style similar to Blink-​182. As members graduated or left, the bands merged into one, which continues to be active. Will has had the pleasure of following their adventures through to the present day. Several of our former students perform or work in the recording and entertainment industry, and we maintain connections with them through social media. Will also holds yearly reunions as a key part of the recording club.

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13.4. Model Three: Electronic Music Group In 2008, Will began teaching music technology full time. At first, he found it frightening. He had trained for years to teach band, and he was afraid to leave the comfort of an established professional track (not to mention the job security). He worried that a full-​time music tech program would collapse under its own weight, or that the new advanced class might not attract students reliably. Will followed his instincts as an ensemble director and decided to supplement the lab classes with afterschool programs, both to add value to the program and to build a community of loyal students. He realized that the recording club would be a natural haven for the pop-​up rock bands that already existed in the school, as ad hoc groups of four or five students would get together and play cover songs for their friends’ parties or gigs. Will invited these groups into the recording club to get their songs recorded and to reach out to a larger audience in the school. The recording club has met every Monday since then, with the same sign-​up sheet for the past ten years. The club provides live music outdoors in the school courtyard during the annual art show, and this has become a draw for the outside community as well. The main challenge with recording club has been its unpredictable nature. Some years, it’s dominated by rock bands or rap groups, while other years see mostly acoustic guitars and singer-​songwriters. This eclecticism is not intrinsically bad, but it does make it difficult to curate an image and brand when the potential audience and focus keep changing so dramatically from year to year. Will began to be invited to speak about his new program at regional conferences and conventions. The eTech Ohio conference asked him to bring his students to demo their projects in a booth for the day. Will was afraid they might be bored by this, so he brought along a rapper from recording club, who freestyled verses over beats while teachers came and went.1 It was not a traditional performance, but one of the conference organizers asked if they would be interested in coming back the next year and opening for the keynote speaker. This was new territory: a class that was dedicated militantly to nonperformance non-​ensemble ideals being asked to perform at a conference. Will needed a new strategy.

13.4.1. The Birth of the Electronic Music Group Will conceived of the Electronic Music Group (EMG) as a pairing of student electronic and recording projects with a live singer. He wanted to stitch all of the songs together into a continuous mix without breaks, as in a DJ set. The reason was simple: the eTech Ohio conference had allotted his group a one-​hour time slot to perform while the audience entered the main ballroom to take their seats for the keynote. There would be no opportunity to talk to the crowd. Live visuals are a standard feature of live electronic music, and Will planned to use a simple camera setup showing what the students were doing with 1 If you are unfamiliar with hip-​hop culture, as we were when we went into our professional music teaching lives, you will be surprised at how willing rappers are to improvise lyrics in public. Ethan was involved in the creation of New York University’s CORE Music Program, a kind of recording club for rappers. When the CORE members did a concert at the 2017 NYU IMPACT Conference, it began with all the performers onstage improvising a song together from scratch, including the instrumental backing. It may have been in keeping with standard hip-​hop practice, but it was nevertheless awe-​inspiring.

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their equipment. He was afraid that audience members would think the students were simply pressing play on prerecorded tracks and not actually doing anything in real time. (This fear turns out to have been overblown.) EMG continues to largely take the same form. While Will is figuring out the personnel for the next year, he tries to identify six to eight students who can work closely together for an extended period of time. The “audition” consists of his observational notes during music tech class, recording club, or any other time when he can see students working. The typical lineup consists of two or three singers, one rapper, two or three producers/​ keyboardists, and one “visualist.” 13.4.1.1. Who Does EMG Perform For?

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Will has found that the most difficult aspect of creating a student-​led pop music group is finding performance opportunities. The group is not like a traditional band or choir. It would be inappropriate and uncomfortable to have it perform for parents or judges. The informal material fits better in a youth culture setting like a club or party than in the “high society” trappings of a concert hall or school auditorium.2 In its early years, EMG only performed for music education conventions. Because the group was so unusual, it attracted many such invitations. A roomful of music teachers may not be the ideal audience for a half-​planned, half-​improvised electronic set, but it isn’t a bad audience for it either, especially if the crowd includes college-​aged music education students. As EMG evolved, self-​contained youth events were created to focus the efforts of the group. In an inversion of traditional school programming, Loud in the Library and Springwave (EMG’s home events) are open to the public, but are only marketed to youth.

13.4.2.  Equipment An electronic music group can function with as little equipment as a laptop and a pair of monitor speakers. However, a broader variety of gear creates correspondingly broader performance possibilities: DJ’ing, live playing of synthesizers and samplers, synchronizing laptops and other devices via MIDI, adding real-​time effects processing to vocals and instruments, live looping, and so on. In order to make all this work, you will need to be familiar with the kinds of gear that make live electronic music look and sound its best (Figure 13.1). Electronic ensembles face technical hurdles similar to those faced by rock bands and “modern bands.” You have to consider both the electronic instruments themselves (sound production) and the PA and monitoring systems (sound reinforcement). Will’s EMG has the additional challenges of synchronization among instruments and lighting, as well as a more complex backline than is normally found in school rock ensembles (Figure 13.2). The term “backline” includes all of the supporting instruments and amplifiers in a band, including drums, which are typically arranged toward the back of the stage. In DJ 2 At the same NYU conference referenced above, the keynote was given by the hip-​hop educator and emcee Toni Blackman. She had the unenviable task of freestyling a rap verse first thing in the morning for a group of academics in a university concert hall. Not only did she succeed in hyping up the crowd, but also she inspired Ethan to volunteer to give his first ever public beatboxing performance to accompany her. Few students will have Toni’s heroic levels of self-​confidence and vibe, so it falls to us to create a congenial performance environment for them.

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Figure 13.1 Electronic Music Group preshow setup.

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Figure 13.2 Bass

Moog Sub Phatty Roland V-4 Visualist stuff

Korg Minilogue Moog Matriarch

Guitar

Macbook x 2 Ableton Push x 2 DMXis MIDI Fighter Twister

Vocals

shows, the backline is the only element of the show, as all of the equipment that produces (or appears to produce) the sound is on the DJ table. By the same token, all of EMG could be considered a backline as well, though in practice it’s folded into a U-​shape so that performers can make eye contact. There are two laptops on the back table. One is the “mothership.” It plays backing tracks and distributes lighting cues and synchronization signals via DMX and MIDI connections (Figure 13.3). This computer keeps the group’s sequencers in time and ties

Backline and instrument placement.

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Figure 13.3 Main laptop live set. “Vox” and “Backing” are backing elements or for rehearsal purposes, “DJ Left” and “DJ Right” are channels dedicated to DJ sets, and the “LIGHTS” group includes lighting automation cues and macro triggers for the DMX lighting controller.

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the main show elements together, so it is critical that it not crash.3 The mothership is the newest and fastest machine available, and Will tries to keep failure-​prone connections to a minimum. It outputs clock signals via USB to a dedicated MIDI interface, and it outputs lighting cues via USB to a dedicated DMX interface. Audio runs through a very stable audio interface (or the headphone jack if a reliable interface isn’t available). No software instruments are played through the mothership, and care is taken to reduce CPU load before shows begin. The second laptop on the center table is dedicated to drum and software instruments played live by the performers. This computer is kept in sync with the mothership wirelessly via Ableton Link. The rest of the sound is produced either through standard vocal mics, through guitar and instrument cables to amps or DI boxes, or by routing through various analog and digital synthesizers. Electronic instruments can produce a far wider range of frequencies than standard acoustic and electric instruments. They demand reinforcement systems capable of reproducing clear high end and powerful bass. Standard PA speakers or array-​style systems like the Bose F1 (Figure 13.4) are great for producing midrange and high-​frequency sounds. If possible, consider adding subwoofers so that the sound will carry well in a variety of spaces. You will need at least one subwoofer for the audience to “feel” the sound, particularly for DJ sets, hip-​hop, and techno. 3 If you are running this kind of mission-​critical computer setup in a professional setting, we recommend that you keep a second laptop on hand with an identical configuration and all of the files and software ready to go, so it can be swapped in at a moment’s notice if necessary. Ethan has had some electronically enhanced musical theater performances saved from disaster this way.

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Figure 13.4

Macbook x 2 Ableton Push x 2 DMXis

Guitar

Bass

Behringer XR18 mixer

Korg Minilogue Moog Matriarch

Moog Sub Phatty Roland V-4 Visualist stuff

Sound reinforcement is done using a portable frontline system, with standard wedge monitors for the group. This particular mixer is wirelessly controlled, allowing the group to perform without the need for long input snakes.

Vocals

Bose F1 PA + Sub

Mackie SRM415 (wedge monitor)

Mackie SRM415 (wedge monitor)

Figure 13.5

Lots o’ Lights

Bose F1 PA

Mackie

Bose F1 PA

ts

ht

s

gh

Roland V-4

Voca e

Bass

Lig

Li

Projector

Laptop/ 2 DMXis Behringer

Moog Pha

Korg Minilogue

Guit

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Bose F1 PA + Sub

Lighting and visuals are a key component of any modern live show. Real-​world electronic performers consider these elements to be as crucial to the concert experience as the music itself. The professionals prefer not to outsource visuals to outsiders, and they definitely do not use generic DJ lights. Understanding DMX lighting can be a challenging task, especially if you are more invested in music and audio components that have standardized controls and signal paths (Figure 13.5). You can most easily understand DMX as a parallel to MIDI. Both protocols are low-​latency digital signals that have been in use for several decades. In both MIDI and DMX, parameters usually range between the

Visual system for the group. DMX signals are sent from the main computer running the backing tracks, and MIDI is sent to the Roland V-​4 video mixer. Thus, all lighting and video patterns run in sync with the music in real time while still allowing DJs to hand-​control the tempo.

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Figure 13.6 DMXis lighting software running as a plugin in Ableton Live. In this page, “LED PAR 64” is a can light that takes up four channels. Each parameter has been exposed to Live via Live’s plugin interface for further grouping and automation.

242  Figure 13.7 Lighting is organized into groups for easy automation. In this photo, all Red channels in the front of group are controlled at once with the “F Red” macro knob.

numbers 0 and 127, and both use an older cable standard for transmitting these signals (XLR for DMX and 5-​pin/​3-​pin DIN for MIDI). MIDI works with all keyboard instruments, because the musical language is universal among manufacturers and devices. Lighting devices are not so standardized, so DMX must accommodate devices with different numbers of control channels. For example, a simple light might have four channels: Dimming, Red, Green, and Blue. A more complicated light might have additional channels for Strobe and Preset functions. An even more sophisticated one might have 17 channels, with multiple RGB zones or physical positioning parameters. In EMG, Will manages all DMX commands via Ableton Live and an interface called DMXis (Figure 13.6), which can run as an Audio Unit plugin. Lighting groups and presets (Figure 13.7) then can be programmed in sync with a backing track and can be recalled in either Arrangement or Session View during performances (Figure 13.8.) You can live without synchronized lighting, of course, but it is great to have, because it adds legitimacy and a professional sheen to the performance. Furthermore, programming lights is a valuable skill that transfers directly to the highest professional levels of live performance. Managing and purchasing the equipment for a group like EMG can be intimidating. We have provided a list of equipment the group uses as of this writing (Table 13.1), but do not feel as though all of this equipment must be purchased for your own EMG at the outset. Simply combining a few lab stations and a speaker can be a great way to start combining students’ ideas into something that can be performed for an audience.

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Figure 13.8 Automation curves for lighting channels are programmed in the same familiar way as audio parameters using Live’s Arrangement View. This can be saved as one long MIDI clip to play alongside any audio tracks, and it will respect global and preprogrammed tempo changes.

243  Table 13.1  EMG equipment list.

2016 Macbook

$1500

Playback unit for backing tracks, DJ sets, DMX lighting cues

2011  Macbook Pro

$1150

Playback unit for drum patterns, live finger drumming

2x Ableton Push

$1600

MIDI Controllers for playback units

MIDI Fighter Twister

$300

Discrete MIDI control for master effects

MOTU micro lite

$200

Synchronization of MIDI equipment to master playback laptop

Behringer XR18 mixer

$600

Headless mixer/​stage box

Eleven Rack

$300

Guitar effects & virtual amps controlled with MIDI pedal

Apple Airport Express

$99

Private wireless network for audio control and Ableton Link

Moog Matriarch

$2000

Analog synth for advanced player

Korg Minilogue

$500

Analog synth for chords (intermediate)

Moog Sub Phatty

$700

Analog synth for bass lines (beginner)

DMXis lighting interface

$300

USB to DMX interface for synchronized lighting cues

Panasonic RZ670

$2000

Short throw projector

Roland V-​4

$1000

Analog video mixer for visualist

Bose F1 system

$5000

Mains PA system

Mackie monitors

$800

Wedge monitors for group

Truss + Lighting

$2500

Tables

$450

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13.4.3. A Student Perspective on EMG EMG was created as a student-​led music group, and it has no exact duplicate anywhere. The groups vary from year to year. During a “reboot” year, Will asked a student to watch old videos of the group to determine what the common threads might be. She told him that the music sounded really different in previous years, but there was something that was still “EMG” about it. She decided to create a poster on the topic that we consider to be a founding document of the group (see Figure 13.9).

Figure 13.9 “Understanding EMG,” written by Kelsee Etmans, Lebanon High School, Class of 2017.

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The poster is partially intended to describe why EMG should not have regular audition-​style admittance. The Venn diagram shows that while some members need to have musical skills, not all do; other skills are necessary as well. At the time, Will was having discussions with the group about how to screen members for “good taste,” and what exactly that meant. They all knew who had it, but taste is subjective and hard to define. EMG’s tastemakers tend to care deeply about how music feels, and they have strong opinions about what kinds of songs the group performs. Having these members in your group gives the performances a definite style, and audiences relate well to it. The group also values members whom Will describes as “workhorses.” They may not perform music at all outside of EMG. Sometimes their skills are entirely technical. They will often include a member or two dedicated entirely to visual elements, programming lighting, road-​testing equipment before shows, or filming performances. This in-​house media crew involves visual artists, who can help create posters and merchandise for shows and who can interpret ideas visually, giving the group the feel of an artistic collective that is bigger than just a band.

13.4.4. The Live Set EMG’s performance style has evolved over time, but every iteration of the group has involved elements of DJ’ing, like performing seamless transitions between songs. Sometimes a performance will be all songs with singers, while other performances might be songs interspersed with DJ sets and transitions. The idea is to combine elements of rock-​style live band performance with well-​curated DJ sets. 13.4.4.1. How EMG Makes Mashup “Temp Tracks” for the Group EMG faces a unique problem in its live performances: What should the people who aren’t singing play? Initially, the group would improvise parts over preselected beats that worked for the song, but that made for unstable arrangements. Students began creating their own backing tracks to sing along with, which sounded great but was time-​consuming. This method worked okay for a three-​or four-​song set, but it was unsustainable for eight-​ or nine-​song sets that varied from show to show. Students needed a way to create quick arrangements. The new method grew out of creating DJ sets. The group started building backing tracks out of samples of existing songs. Once the group learned their parts, they could simply swap out the samples. We describe this method of creating backing tracks in the custom cover song project (see Chapter 7.6). 13.4.4.2. School Shows EMG had fun traveling to music education conferences, but the performances were not the purest expression of the group ethos. They needed regular performance opportunities that they had more control over. Their first event, Loud in the Library, was conceived as an all-​EMG show. The group decided to structure it as a party in the school library for their friends on the Friday closest to exam week. The idea was to perform as many songs as were ready, and to fill the rest of the time with DJ sets. The event drew in more people with free food, video games, and a generally good hangout.

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13.4.4.3. Community Shows

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The open-​ mic format is an attractive performance setting for independent young musicians. Open mics give many different kinds of musicians an opportunity to showcase their talents and tastes, and they can bring more and less-​experienced performers together. A group of Will’s alumni started a performance series on this model called The Tingle Show. The name was seemingly chosen because it’s funny, but it actually refers to Jedediah Tingle, an early arts patron of southwest Ohio. The Tingle Show involved live music acts, rock bands, DJs, and the occasional experimental musician. The shows spanned six events over the summer months, and they were hosted at a local community arts center with PA and DJ equipment borrowed from the high school. Each event had a cover charge of $2, which paid for a small stipend for the artists and the materials for decorating and signage. The trio of students who organized this homespun event series displayed the complementary skill sets that an effective creative team needs. One student ran the business end and promoted the events, one ran the technical side of producing the event, and the third acted as artistic director, creating the promotional materials, coming up with the event themes, and recruiting the talent. Unfortunately, the event series only lasted a year, because the trio moved on toward their career paths, as students do. Still, the series was an eye-​opening experience for all involved. Using a similar model, our colleague Anne Fennell runs an annual event in southern California called Rock the Hill, which is a community show that grew out of a school event. It draws hundreds of paying attendees each year. Both The Tingle Show and Rock the Hill are essentially curated versions of open-​mic night. The stage is not truly open for anyone present to walk on; instead, the schedule is predetermined. The sets flow from lighter acoustic acts toward the beginning of the event to louder full rock bands, with DJ sets covering the set changes between acts.

References Ableton. (2019). Toni Blackman on the wisdom of the cypher. ableton.com/​en/​blog/​ toni-​blackman-​wisdom-​cypher/​ Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge University Press. Saunders, J. A. (2010). Identity in music: Adolescents and the music classroom. Action, Criticism & Theory for Music Education, 9(2), 70–​78.

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Understanding Student-​Led Groups

Moving beyond traditional education structures to build a lasting electronic music school movement requires more than charismatic teachers and compelling outcomes. It requires a generation of students who feel ownership of their work, and their work has to make a meaningful impact on the school and the community of students at large. You can think of student-​led groups as an insurance policy against hubris, as an investment ensuring student buy-​in to a culture, and as a check on your own power as a tastemaker and influencer in the minds of students. Will’s concert band professor once declared that the teacher’s most important role was to be the arbiter of taste for his student musicians. Of course, the teacher’s taste will always play a major part in the programming of any student activity, but teachers who want to promote student ownership and cultural authenticity in their programs will also need to draw heavily on student input. Electronic music school teachers should be able to play different roles depending on the situation. Teachers will need to exercise more control over an introductory class that covers audio basics, but they should cede more control to students in a smaller, more advanced content-​creation team. This chapter describes what working with such a team is like, and it gives strategies for managing a more democratic classroom while also ensuring quality control and continuity.

14.1. The Teacher’s Role (Hint: Very Different) The first years of initiating a student-​led group are the hardest. A teacher needs to get the group off the ground. Will has done this twice, with the Electronic Music Group (see Chapter 13) and Drake Road Productions, a group centered on a TV production class. Establishing a goal for Drake Road required forethought, as there was not a clear reason for its existence at first. From the school’s perspective, Will had just taken on the daily TV announcements class, which seemed like a technical fit for the work he was doing in music tech. However, the students who signed up were very different from the former teacher’s crew. Rather than a group of would-​be journalism students, Will had a TV production class stocked with an eclectic variety of independent musicians. The group’s mandate from the school was to continue airing the dry announcements show, but it quickly became clear to Will that his group would not be happy doing that for

Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0014

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long. In the following years, the students added skits, jokes, music videos, and anything else that they felt would add personality to their TV shows. The side projects eventually outgrew the news show and became a monthly variety program that the school actually looked forward to watching. Currently, the team still dutifully produces the dry news show each day, but they get it done as quickly as possible so they can move on to their creative projects. This experience became Will’s blueprint for creating new student-​directed programs. He came to see that his role was not to tell the students how to spend their time, but to set expectations for productivity and deadlines, and to be a proxy for the audience. He found that he could strike a balance between giving the students their autonomy and maintaining their focus, while still exercising quality control. He did this by acting not as the director of activities, but as the “director of the directors.” He helped the students to create a workflow, and then he continually adapted and refined it with successive cohorts of students.

14.2. Remember the Prime Directive 248 

All teenagers belong to a musical culture, whether they study music formally or not. They have favorite artists and genres, they participate in fandoms, and some of them write, record, and perform their own songs. As teachers, we have a responsibility to preserve and promote our students’ homegrown musical lives. As we do, we try to follow the most important law in the Star Trek universe, the Prime Directive: don’t interfere in the natural evolution of a culture or civilization (Chapter 6.11). For teachers who want to support students’ musical lives outside the classroom, the first step is to observe what’s already happening under the radar. Are young artists performing at cafes, bookstores, or other casual venues? Are there bands or DJs that mostly play parties for friends? Or were there bands that used to do this, but have broken up? Are there garage/​basement bands and bedroom producers? Songwriters and emcees who have journals of songs but who never record or play out? Kids who take lessons but don’t perform? Family bands that mainly play at home? Do local community centers or churches have teenage hangouts or open mic nights? Listen carefully for students talking about these types of activities. The kids who participate in them are your natural constituency. Build a rapport with them and find out what they need.

14.3. Building Creative Teams The first years of a student-​led group are chaotic, as members age in and out. You can build continuity by having outgoing members reflect on their positive experiences and pass on their wisdom to the next generation of students. At the end of each term, Will has his top seniors create informational and inspirational posters. He collects the posters into a style guide that he distributes to new members the following term (Figure 14.1). This has been especially helpful in subject areas where Will was not an expert himself. When he took over Drake Road Productions, he had particularly adept students make posters on video-​specific topics like framing subjects for documentary-​style interviews (Figure 14.2) and how to use manual mode on a camera.

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Understanding Student-Led Groups

Figure 14.1 Opening page of the Drake Road Productions style guide.

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14.4. The Whiteboard Session The first step for any creative group project is the brainstorming session. Student-​led groups are no exception. Brainstorming sessions can be used to prepare for upcoming performances, song choices, video projects, or whatever else the group takes on. The key to a good brainstorming session is to have students feel safe in the face of intense peer pressure and scrutiny. Pitching creative ideas to a group is a vulnerable position to be in. It’s hard enough for adults, and teenagers are even less self-​confident and self-​ disciplined. As you moderate the conversation, you need to allow enough freedom for

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Figure 14.2 “Documentary Style,” written by Joanna Allen, Lebanon High School class of 2018.

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ideas to flow, while keeping enough control that the group doesn’t run amok. You can also appoint a trusted student leader to act as moderator. Early idea sessions should be open-​ended and brief. The idea is to throw proverbial spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks. Your goal for this first pass is to simply fill the whiteboard with possibilities. Don’t criticize or pick apart the ideas yet, just get them down. For the second stage, go back through the list and have the person who thought of each idea pitch it briefly to the group and answer questions about it (Figure 14.3). Some students will withdraw their ideas at this point, and others will propose new ones.

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Figure 14.3 Electronic music group whiteboard session with song ideas. Students who want to progress with an idea claim it after the first session by writing their initials after it.

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Over the next few days, students who feel strongly about their idea should begin to develop it. Others can sign on to help them. If an idea shows promise, put a star on it and direct resources to it. Remove abandoned ideas from the board. The process of “steel sharpening steel” might result in some bruised egos and hurt feelings. Make a rule that no one can directly dismiss any idea aside from its originator or the faculty advisor. You can now run scenarios by students and begin assigning deadlines. As work on a project progresses toward the delivery date, use the whiteboard to check in and add status updates to active ideas (Figure 14.4).

14.5. Giving and Taking Criticism Criticism and feedback are both the most important and the most delicate parts of the creative process, especially in a student-​led group. Learning how to give and take feedback is as important for future professionals as the creative skills themselves. Not surprisingly, teenagers are not naturally gifted at this. Teachers can model giving frequent but oblique criticism. Sometimes a student will have an idea they feel passionately about, but it doesn’t resonate with the group. Maybe the idea is great and just needs to

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Figure 14.4 TV production class whiteboard after three or four refinement sessions. Checkmarks indicate finished work that will end up in the episode. This episode was set to air the week after the COVID-​19 lockdown began in March 2020.

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be communicated more clearly. Or maybe it needs to be gently put out of its misery. Here are some scenarios you may encounter, and strategies to handle them. • A project has glaring technical problems, but the student is protective of the work and resists attempts to help. The student is most likely afraid that their work will be deleted or invalidated. They will be less protective if you duplicate their project and leave the original intact. Then you and the group can make changes to the duplicate and compare them to the original. The student may not be immediately convinced, but they will at least be able to consider the alternative cut without feeling that anything has been taken away from them. • A song has inappropriate lyrics or other content. Tread lightly here. Maybe you want or need to keep profanity and graphic images out of your program, but you also don’t want to crush the student’s creative spirit. Frame this problem in terms of reaching the broadest possible audience. Could someone listen to the song with their younger siblings or grandparents in the room? Suggest that the student

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Understanding Student-Led Groups

make a “radio edit” to invite in more listeners, while holding on to the explicit version for their own use. • A student thinks their idea is better/​more effective than it is. This is the hardest scenario to manage. Maybe a song is supposed to evoke a complex emotion, but it comes across as vindictive and mean. Maybe a video skit is supposed to be funny, but the jokes don’t land. Maybe a whiteboard idea is logistically unfeasible for reasons that are hard for the student to understand. Or maybe the idea just doesn’t make sense. You give some initial feedback, but the student digs in their heels. Rather than setting yourself up as the judge, get their peers involved. The student needs to hear criticism from someone they trust, and that might not be you just yet. Have the student pitch the project to the group instead—​this takes the focus off pleasing you, and instead helps the student to be more attentive and responsive to audience reaction. Asking the student to pay attention to the other group members’ expressions and body language may also help to get the point across.

14.6. Refining Ideas Before They Get Made An idea in the planning stage is a floating soap bubble, liable to pop from the slightest disturbance. How do you refine an idea without losing the spirit and energy behind it? Start by mirroring that energy: “That’s really interesting!” Ask the student to think about a specific aspect of the idea or write it down. Then you can talk about the written version, rather than directly about the idea itself. If the project is a live event, write out a timeline. If the project is a song to remix, write out the production steps. If it's a video or multimedia project, write out shots and scenes. If a creative student does not have the planning skills necessary to bring an idea to fruition, pair them with someone who does. (Ethan thinks in terms of directors and producers: every wild-​ eyed visionary needs a practically minded partner. It’s rare that the same person can fill both roles.) We encourage teachers to read reports of creativity research, and not just in musical contexts. Visual artists, standup comedians, filmmakers, and book authors face similar struggles, and they have many useful strategies for overcoming them. Books like The War of Art by Steven Pressfield (2002), How to Be an Artist by Jerry Saltz (2020), and The Art of Noticing by Rob Walker (2019) are poetic enough to speak to the artistic souls in your group and hard-​nosed enough to solve practical problems. Jason Theodor’s work on creative types is useful, too (Figure 14.5). He draws inspiration from the Gallop/​Clifton Strengths Tests, and he adapts them to artistic contexts. The idea is not to try to identify immutable personality traits, but to pinpoint modes and roles within a creative team.

14.7. Facilitating, or “What Can You Do That They Can’t?” Facilitating the work of student-​led groups can be the most fulfilling aspect of teaching. When a student wonders how they can bring an idea to reality, it presents a learning opportunity both for you and for them. Here are some real examples: “I want to have

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synchronized lights with my music.” “I want this specific synth sound in my song.” “I want to DJ a set via Instagram over a school Zoom account.” Students may be able to solve these problems on their own, but they may not be able to do it efficiently, and their solutions won’t benefit other students with similar problems. You, the teacher, are the master troubleshooter and refiner of ideas. As you guide students toward the techniques and skills they need to attain their goals, you are enacting a smaller-​scale and Figure 14.5

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Three of Jason Theodor’s creative types (used with permission) and the combination of creative types into creative paths. The slides explain creative growth as a combination of different attributes: mimic, empath, producer, and so on. Teachers can identify these attributes in their students and put students into teams with complementary strengths, thereby avoiding conflict between students with incompatible attributes.

(a)

(b)

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Understanding Student-Led Groups

(c)

Figure 14.5 Continued

255  (d)

personalized version of the project design process (Chapter 6). You know how to identify and learn techniques, how to work with limited resources, how to create and document a workflow, and how to refine and adapt the workflow as students put it into practice. This pattern of learning/​creating/​refining is a kind of metacreativity, and it is empowering and energizing to develop it within yourself.

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14.8. How Ideas from Student-​Led Groups Benefit Lab-​Based Courses Once a workflow has been created for an independent student project, it can be brought back into formal teaching. An individual student’s passion project can sometimes become the basis for a class project. This is how Will started to teach advanced video effects in his lab courses. He had incorporated video into a few projects, like soundscape (Chapter 9.5), movie soundtrack (Chapter 7.7), and video beatboxing (Chapter 9.7), but he mostly saw it as tangential to his main mission. Meanwhile, his TV production class had started using green screen to composite shots. One particularly ambitious group made a Star Wars parody that involved complex compositing and rotoscoping. As Will helped the students figure it all out, he realized that the keyframing and timeline editing were a lot like automation curves in a DAW, and that TV production students who had also taken music tech were well equipped to learn these skills. “School Wars” became a recurring series, and green-​screen compositing is now de rigueur in the TV production class.

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14.9. The Core Values Students who self-​direct also self-​select. When independent-​minded students have visible creative success, it can be a double-​edged sword, since they will motivate a wave of imitators, whose work may not be as authentic or inventive. In order to keep the stream of talent and creativity fresh, the teacher can have the students define a set of core values that they follow from year to year. The process can be formalized, but it’s even better if it is totally student-​organized. Pose the question, “What makes [student-​led group] work?” and facilitate an extended conversation on the topic. As the most personally invested students identify what makes the group special and successful for them, the articulation of their values sets the tone for future group members, too. The core values don’t need to be a strict set of rules; instead, treat them as a helpful guide to what the group expects of new members (Figure 14.6). Student-​led groups will not always be successful. When a TV show falls flat or a DJ set clears the dance floor, it’s not fun, but it is an opportunity for learning. Dealing with failure and disappointment is as much a part of the creative process as enjoying success. When you guide students through the grief-​like process of failure, you prepare them to handle adversity in their future lives, and they can pass on their wisdom to their peers as well. As one of Will’s students wrote, “Success is a form of revenge” (Figure 14.7). That’s the kind of plain language that any teenager can understand. You can help students learn to feel as proud of the work they don’t release as the work they do release, and to be more empathetic with audiences and fellow creators alike.

14.10. Going Beyond Music: Film, TV Shows, Other Content, and Media Production If you expand your classes to other media and academic disciplines, you will build connections between your young musicians and other students with strengths and interests outside of music. This will set up a positive feedback loop that benefits everyone involved. Music production skills can easily transfer to any kind of timeline-​based media

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Understanding Student-Led Groups

Figure 14.6 “The Core Values,” written by Olivia Meade, Lebanon High School class of 2018.

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production. Skilled electronic musicians have a major advantage in learning film, television and game production too. Having a broader focus that includes broadcast media or video opens up gig and career prospects down the road. We know quite a few musicians who make their living as sound designers, video editors and software developers. The students responsible for the core values in Figure 14.6 were central members of an Electronic Music Group, and they were responsible for making two TV shows, running a recording studio club, and running a film production club. These experiences informed their college choices and inspired new professional ambitions. Each member from that year chased their personal strengths while developing a broad set of multimedia skills that will carry them far beyond high school. When students learn how do creative work in a multifaceted group, they are not just becoming better artists; they are setting themselves up to be successful members of a writing room, an advertising agency, an

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Figure 14.7 “Success Is a Form of Revenge,” written by Skye Wheeler, Lebanon High School class of 2019.

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engineering team, an internet startup, or any other professional group that demands creative problem-​solving. If you broaden your curriculum in response to the interests of your student-​led groups, it might end up broadening your definition of a school music department. You have already branched out from classical ensembles and music appreciation to include electronic music production, and possibly electronic performances too. Why not include some of the other time-​based arts as well? Professional musicians increasingly have to be able to do their own business, marketing, video production and storytelling. If you can expose your students to this wider range of skills, it will enhance their experience, expand their future options, and give your department a stronger voice in the school community in the bargain.

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References Pressfield, S. (2002). The war of art. Black Irish Books. Saltz, J. (2020). How to be an artist. Riverhead Books. Walker, R. (2019). The art of noticing: 131 ways to spark creativity, find inspiration, and discover joy in the everyday. Knopf.

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15.1. Burn It All Down

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Before the COVID-​19 pandemic caught us all by surprise in early 2020, music education had only dipped its toe in the waters of online instruction. Suddenly, however, we were all thrown in to sink or swim. As we write this, the pandemic shows no signs of abating in the United States anytime soon, so teaching online is going to be an ongoing fact of life. We are always in favor of re-​evaluating received professional wisdom, but now, as the entire profession finds itself upended, everyone is having to question their methods and approaches, and fast. Will regularly gives speeches at music education events urging the next generation of music teachers to “burn it all down.” He means that we do not have to teach music in the ways we were taught, and that we should rethink the basic concepts of our classes, prerequisites and performances. Most of our colleagues want to pass on the musical experiences that shaped them, but now that the pandemic has burned it all down, we have both the opportunity and the obligation to rethink some assumptions. This chapter discusses how an electronic music school works in a post-​COVID world, both online and in person with social distancing.

15.2. Change Everything Music programs in public schools devote most of their time and money to activities that gather large groups of people together to rehearse, and even larger groups of people to cheer them on at concerts. Performance-​driven programs are reeling from the pandemic. Career choir directors are reading study after study showing that singing causes viruses to spread more efficiently, and they worry that they may never lead a choir again. If you are in a situation where you can’t teach music the way you want to, or the way you believe to be the “right way,” you have a few choices: You can quit teaching music; you can adapt your large ensemble to the situation; you can use your former ensemble’s classroom to teach different material; or you can find a new way to teach music. Other fields have had to adapt to major changes in our lifetime. Sports have changed their rules because fans objected to violence. Academics changed their teaching and research in the face of computers and the internet. Film and TV producers are writing and casting their shows differently because audiences object to racial and gender Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0015

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discrimination. In the world of music education, the American model of the large ensemble is overdue for reconsideration, because it is out of alignment with much of the rest of the world. In the United Kingdom and Australia, for example, compulsory curricular music consists mainly of individual and small-​group instruction, while large ensembles are extracurricular. In a world where compulsory large-​group instruction is a safety hazard, U.S. schools may need to flip their model as well. Before the pandemic, we took for granted that we could watch students as they worked, give them subtle feedback, and see their faces as they heard or felt something. We could feel the emotional energy in a room. We could hear someone working in another room behind a closed door, and we could see the lights of a live set flashing from down the hallway. We could feel the euphoria of a performance in front of a supportive crowd. We could play unplanned riffs while improvising with a friend, and we could have ideas sparked from a casual conversation in a hallway. How many of these experiences can we replicate online? Consider a live show. It involves performers, audience, and a space. All of your senses are engaged: hearing and sight, as heightened by the PA system and lights, but touch, smell, and even taste (since food is often served at concerts) as well. The computer can transmit only sight and sound, and only a limited version of those. Faceless audience members react silently with typed comments, if they react at all. Can such a performance be satisfying? Will it always feel forced or fake? Will it even feel like a performance at all? Will’s students had to confront this problem in May 2020. With social distancing at its strictest, they began meeting online as a group to figure out new project ideas and the logistics of borrowing equipment. They decided to take a song they had already recorded and shoot a music video for it. They figured out how to DJ over Zoom with a feedback camera running Instagram filters for a visual element. At the end of the term, they invited friends and alumni to a virtual approximation of their end-​of-​year music festival. Two hundred people were able to attend, which is the same size audience they would have had for an in-​person concert. Of course, it wasn’t the same experience. But it hit the right emotional beats, and seniors cried as they watched videos recapping the year. To be fair, though, Will had worked with this group in person for three quarters of the school year. What might an entirely remote future look like?

15.3. Moving the Electronic Music School Online Students do not love extended videoconferences. Who can blame them? Adults don’t either. Our online classes in the Spring 2020 sometimes felt like overlong work meetings. Whatever a successful model of online schooling looks like, it will not be daily Zoom calls where groups of 30 students wait for a teacher to check in with each person. Successful models of online interaction all follow the same maxim: “Respect their time, respect your time.” Below, we present four models of online teaching. To evaluate them, we suggest you use the Meaningful Engagement Matrix devised by Steve Dillon and his colleagues (2009). One axis in the matrix lists modes of creative engagement: appreciating, selecting, directing, exploring, and intuiting. The other axis lists types of meaning: personal, social, and cultural (Figure 15.1). The more processes and meanings online activities are able to engage, the more meaningful the activity will be.

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Figure 15.1 The Meaningful Engagement Matrix, adapted from Dillon et al. (2009).

15.3.1. Smaller Group or Individual Meetings

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Videoconferencing tools like Zoom can accommodate dozens of participants at a time. However, with more than ten people, it’s hard for everyone to meaningfully engage, and the format inevitably devolves into a lecture. Ethan had some wonderful Zoom classes this spring, but no more than five or six students were ever really interacting, while everyone else listened passively. Consider breaking students into smaller subgroups that meet regularly for interactive check-​ins. Relationships are maintained better this way, and you can give more meaningful feedback. Individual private meetings are great, but you have only so many hours in a day. Instead, offer individual “office hours” or email support in addition to the small group meetings.

15.3.2. Synchronous Class Meeting That Breaks into Smaller Groups You might begin by doing the demonstration of the day and an interactive full-​group activity before breaking the class into smaller groups. Will started sessions of an online college class by leading a creativity exercise or mindfulness meditation—​he found that he had better control over the sound system in this setting than he did in “real life.” Then students were free to either log off and go work on their own projects or stay in the conference for a public help session. Students were surprisingly willing to hang around to watch others troubleshoot their specific issues, occasionally popping in to ask their own questions. Some students actively helped their peers work through production issues. Note, however, that this model works best when students are relatively mature.

15.3.3. Asynchronous Online Class For the past several years, Ethan has been a member of the Disquiet Junto (disquiet.com/​ 2012/​01/​27/​the-​disquiet-​junto/​), an online community of electronic music composers and producers. Junto organizer Marc Weidenbaum emails out a weekly compositional challenge to the group’s members. If you want to participate, you submit your track to an online forum, and then you listen to and comment on other submissions. The most interesting projects involve collaboration between members. Some Junto projects are straightforward remix challenges, where participants are asked to use previous project submissions as raw material for new music. For example, when Junto member Jeffry Melton died, the group did a tribute project where members recorded their own accompaniment to a recording of one of his performances. The next

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week, members extended the virtual duets to trios by recording accompaniments to each other’s accompaniments. Ethan feels a strong sense of community with other Junto members, even though he has met very few of them face to face. He uses the Junto model for his own class projects (Hein, 2020), including having students remix each other’s assignments. As we face the challenge of creating social bonds when we are physically separate, the Junto is a valuable model. Rock, pop, hip-​hop, and techno musicians have used online forums for peer education for decades. Ethan mainly learned guitar by collecting tablature files and chord charts on Usenet in the days before the World Wide Web. Both of us have learned a substantial amount about production by participating in forum threads. However, we recognize that the format benefits people who learn best through reading and writing. We are writers, so naturally we like to communicate in writing, but this is not true of many students. If you decide to use forums for teaching, consider which learning tasks work best in written form. If you are teaching and testing vocabulary or giving essay-​type writing assignments, forum threads are ideal. They also work well for troubleshooting and technical support. Most music technology companies moderate support forums, and you can certainly structure the technical aspect of your class this way as well. Curated playlists of listening examples are another good asynchronous format. You might create class playlists that students contribute to—​either you can curate them, or the group can do it by consensus. You can create public or shared playlists using YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music, and SoundCloud. Students can use playlists to communicate their tastes to each other without using up scarce videoconferencing time. You can also use playlists to share final versions of projects. (Ethan required his college students to post their projects to Bandcamp or SoundCloud before the pandemic anyway.) Even in a face-​ to-​face class, playlists are great for introverts who want to share music with their peers, but who don’t necessarily want to watch them listen in person.

15.3.4. Live-​Streaming Sessions You might cap off a project by having students “perform” their work, either for classmates in a closed video conference, or publicly via a live-​streaming platform. The “students-​ only” option is better if students are uncertain about their work and need a safe space to receive feedback. This “performance” method is essentially the same as a listening session in a face-​to-​face class: each person gives a short introduction, plays their track, and receives comments. Transitions from one presentation to the next tend to go faster online than they do in person, so you get more time for feedback. Just make sure that everyone unmutes their mic to applaud! If you want truly public performances, you can stream them on YouTube or Facebook. Alternatively, you might use Twitch, a platform created for gamers to play in front of online audiences. It may seem strange to want to watch someone else play video games, but it’s not very different from watching sports, and it is a routine part of life for many kids. Twitch is surprisingly well suited to music performance. It’s more like busking on a sidewalk than playing in a concert hall: performers can take requests, interact with the crowd, and even accept tips.

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15.4.  Rebuilding Every crisis is a time of change. As the pandemic unfolds, our only choice is to try new approaches. Like the protagonist in Joseph Campbell’s “hero’s journey,” we can never really return home again, and some aspects of schooling may never go back to the way they were. We can’t control our circumstances; all we can do is choose how we will respond, adapt, and rebuild.

References Dillon, S., Adkins, B., Brown, A., & Hirche, K. (2009). Communities of sound: Examining meaningful engagement with generative music making and virtual ensembles. International Journal of Community Music, 1(3), 357–​374. Hein, E. (2020). The Disquiet Junto as an online community of practice. In J. Waldron, S. Horsley, & K. Veblen (Eds.), Oxford handbook of social media and music learning. Oxford University Press.

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A Rising Tide John F. Kennedy was fond of quoting a saying from the New England Chamber of Commerce: “A rising tide lifts all boats” (1963). Someday, teaching music production as an art class will be no more unusual in schools than bucket drumming or boomwhackers are now. However, we recognize that not everyone is on board with the idea, and that there is resistance to the idea of embracing popular electronic and dance music in school.   One objection often voiced is that techno and hip-​hop are less musically substantive than canonical music. Another criticism is that digital production is “just pushing buttons” and is an impoverished experience compared to playing a “real” instrument. However, readers who have come this far in this book know that we believe electronic production is a creative medium like any other, one that can be used for a variety of purposes, from the venal to the sublime. Our own experience has shown the laptop to have as much potential depth of expression as any other form of musical experience we’ve tried.

There are some educators who agree with us that electronic dance music and hip-​hop are wonderful, but they do not see the need to teach them in school. Why devote scarce resources to teaching music that students are already immersed in outside of school? Shouldn’t the classroom be a place where students learn things they don’t already know? This is a fair point! We have three responses. First, if we are serious about teaching music as an art class, then our students have to be free to create in the styles that are meaningful to them. Second, there is a difference between listening to pop music and knowing how to create it. We believe that creative fulfillment should not be limited to the most self-​motivated and autodidactic bedroom producers. Third, and most important, by validating students’ own musical identities, we send an implicit message of social and political inclusion.

16.1. Maximum Reach and Demographics Few people participate in orchestras or marching bands outside of school. Nevertheless, music teachers retain “ideological power that is disproportionate to the number of people engaged in their species of musical activity” (Cavicchi, 2009, p. 101). This is why a friend of Ethan’s expressed regret that he “stopped playing music” when he gave up classical flute in high school, and then a moment later, described singing carols and playing Latin Electronic Music School. Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2021. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780190076634.003.0016

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percussion with his family every Christmas (Elbert Garcia, personal communication, March 10, 2015). School music is not the only vector for music education. For example, when Adam Bell (2016) became a “high school music dropout,” he made clear that he had “quit school music, not music” (p. 243, emphasis in original). Still, the stigma of failure is a heavy psychological burden to carry. Too many would-​be amateur musicians are unable to shrug off this burden. By recognizing students’ musical identities, we could attract many more young people to participate. Ethan has done some work in a middle school in Harlem, where he is often the only white person in the room. The school offers several afterschool music programs, including a woodwind class. The students gamely honk and squeak on their clarinets, but their teacher faces a steep uphill climb. These young people rarely hear any music involving clarinets outside the classroom. It is hard to imagine any of them becoming passionate about the instrument, much less creating original music with it. The cultural context is simply not there. It should come as no surprise that when students get the chance to create music “in their own style,” the results almost always sound like the music that they listen to in their daily lives (Rodriguez, 2004, pp. 20–​21). We need to be able to support them in doing so. As is discussed in Chapter 1, there is a wide gulf between “school” music and “popular” music. This was not always the case. Nineteenth-​century European conservatories were preparing musicians to play the music that was popular at the time. Wind bands became widely established in American schools when they were at their peak popularity in everyday American life (Kratus, 2019). School choirs were similarly meant to prepare students for community choirs. Why, then, do American schools no longer teach the music that is popular and practiced outside of school? Many music educators feel a responsibility to elevate and broaden students’ tastes, and we support that goal, but we believe that the road to a broader musical landscape must begin close to home.

16.2. How Traditional Music Groups Thrive Because of Project-​Based Courses Your school’s student body has an untapped constituency for your performing arts program: all those musicians and would-​be musicians whose preferences and identities don’t align with official music. These students are making beats, rapping, playing in garage bands, posting amateur music videos online, singing in church, and participating in fan communities. “Many students are zealous, deeply involved listeners who can tell us, in depth, after only a few moments of hearing a popular piece, the backgrounds of the piece and of its performers, why they value it, how it relates to similar and different pieces, the musical qualities it incorporates, and so on” (Reimer, 2009, p. 302). Some of these musicians (or would-​be musicians) are present in your ensembles, but they are disengaged or disruptive. Others have opted out. If you can validate and engage their existing enthusiasms, the ripples will spread outward to their friends and family. One concern we hear about music technology programs is that they will lure potential ensemble participants away. This is a real possibility. However, Will’s experience has shown that a music technology program can feed ensembles as well. Digital production offers an endless variety of sounds, but not all of those sounds are satisfying. Controlling synthesizers and samplers via MIDI works well for percussive and keyboard

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sounds, but it is awkward at best for stringed and wind instruments. A student who is pursuing musical ideas involving guitar or saxophone will quickly run up against the limitations of those instruments’ digital emulations. This student is a natural candidate for band or lessons. We do not support the use of popular music as “bait” to lure students into participating in “real” music. However, students who are already musically engaged are the ones who are most likely to become curious about music outside of their comfort zone.

16.3. A Performing Arts Program That Truly Elevates Culture All American popular music since ragtime has been shaped by the vernacular traditions of the African diaspora. This is more true of rap and electronic dance music than in rock, jazz, or any other pop form of the past century. Rap and dance music use little harmony, and the melodies are short and endlessly repeated. When orchestral instruments appear, they are usually sampled; otherwise, the music is dominated by the voice and drums. Jeff Pressing (2002) used the term “Black Atlantic rhythm” to describe the shared features of the music of West Africa and the African diaspora. These shared features include formal aspects like syncopation and groove structures, but they also include the social purposes and meanings of music as a participatory communal activity, not just an object for detached aesthetic contemplation (Regelski, 2016, p. 13). When we decide to broaden our curriculum to include more popular music, it is not just a matter of repertoire or technology; we also have to think about the underlying meaning and purpose of music itself. For most Americans, music is a commercial product whose underlying processes are opaque and inaccessible. Sample-​based hip-​hop and dance producers see the products of the commercial music industry quite differently—​as raw material for new expression, the starting point of the process as much as its endpoint. Since any recording can be sampled and remixed, there doesn’t ever need to be a “final” product at all. Digital audio production has erased the distinction between product and process. “Perhaps the digital musician is making a new kind of music, and the musical situation is once again coming to resemble the informal, process-​based, communal activity of some parts of the non-​Western world” (Hugill, 2012, p. 222). Our fondest wish is for amateur musical creativity to become as widespread and unremarkable as posting photos and videos on social media.

16.4. Critical Popular Music Studies Once you’ve produced some music of your own, you are better equipped to listen critically to the products of the commercial music industry. We love pop music, but we also find most of it to be mediocre or worse. This is all the more reason to help students not to take mainstream music at face value. “That much popular music serves as propaganda or as a substitute for critical awareness may be granted without discounting the importance of addressing it educationally” (Bowman, 2004, p. 39). Musical interpretation is a crucial avenue for developing musical understanding. By interpreting a piece of music, we internalize it and imbue it with our own expression and meaning (Elliott & Silverman, 2014). Recordings pose a problem for musical interpretation because they lock in a specific idea of how a song is “supposed” to sound. This is especially true in current pop, in which the

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specific sonic qualities of the recording are as salient as the underlying performances, notes, and lyrics. Hip-​hop and electronic dance music present an alternative method of interpretation: using recordings themselves as raw material for new expression. Rather than viewing a track’s familiarity as an interpretive limitation, sampling producers use it as a vector for new emotional associations. Formerly disparate musical elements become “dislocated into novel meanings by their provocative aural juxtaposition” (Gilroy, 1993, p. 104). The expressive power of these juxtapositions gives us a new way to form our own interpretive engagement with recordings in any genre. Every semester, Ethan asks his music education students whether they consider unauthorized sampling to be a form of stealing. Most of them respond that they do, before recognizing that without such “stealing,” their preferred music could not exist. Sample-​ based music poses major challenges to the conventional concept of authorship. Consider, for example, the song “Workin’ On It” by Dwele (2008), which samples “Workinonit” by J Dilla (2006), which samples “King of the Beats” by Mantronix (1988), which samples “Pump That Bass” by Original Concept (1986), which samples “Close (To The Edit)” by Art of Noise (1984), which samples “Owner of a Lonely Heart” by Yes (1983), which samples “Kool Is Back” by Funk, Inc. (1971). Many of these tracks contain other samples as well, and most of them have themselves been sampled many times. Educators can use the philosophical quandaries posed by sampling as a useful jumping-​off point for broader conversations about authorship, ownership, and intellectual property.

16.5. Producing and Consuming Audio Is there a more demoralizing phrase than “music consumer”? We like to describe electronic musicians as “producers” precisely because the word is an antonym of “consumer.” Being a producer feels much better than being a consumer. We became music teachers because we know how good it feels to make music, and we want to invite our students to experience that pleasure too. Thomas Turino (2008) distinguished between presentational and participatory musical cultures. In presentational cultures, there’s a clear divide between the performers and the audience. Audience members might dance or sing along, but they are not the focus. Classical and jazz concerts and Broadway musicals are presentational musical experiences. By contrast, participatory cultures involve everyone in actively doing something: playing an instrument, singing and chanting, or dancing. Folk and jazz jam sessions, campfire singalongs, contra dances and hip-​hop cyphers are participatory musical experiences. One of the most enjoyable documents of participatory music is a field recording made by James Koetting in 1975 of postal workers canceling stamps in the post office of the University of Accra, Ghana (Titon & Fujie, 2005). Turino saw more commonalities between the musical experience of American contra dancers and that of Ghanaian drumming than he found between the musical experience of contra dancers and that of audiences at a jazz concert. School music is most participatory in the younger elementary grades. In general music, it is more important that the kids be actively involved than that they sing in tune or play in time. By contrast, high school ensembles are presentational, with a focus on excellence over inclusion. This mirrors the way that our broader society values presentational music

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as being “real” music. The commercial products of dance music and hip-​hop have the professional polish of presentational forms, but they emerge from participatory cultures. The feature of West African musical tradition that has survived most intact into present Afrodiasporic music is the open-​ended loop form. This form co-​evolved with an ethos of group participation. In traditional African cultures, music is “an interactive human activity in which everyone is expected to participate: there are no detached listeners, but rather a communion of participants” (Wilson, 2001, p. 161). All dance music offers an implied invitation to participate. “In black culture, the thing (the ritual, the dance, the beat) is ‘there for you to pick it up when you come back to get it’ ” (Snead, 1984, p. 67). Loop-​based music is valuable not just as an object of aesthetic appreciation (though it can be that)—​it’s a platform for active participation.

16.6. Educational Goals and Social Impact Attaining a particular educational goal is a technical problem. However, setting and prioritizing goals in the first place is a political problem (Labaree, 1997). It is not enough for a music program to have “purely musical” goals. School is a place where we communicate to students what our society officially finds valuable and acceptable. Our curricula carry messages of inclusion or exclusion, whether we intend them to or not. Music educators have a responsibility to help students develop cultural competence, an understanding of not just their culture of origin, but other cultures as well (Ladson-​Billings, 2015). For students from minority groups, cultural competence requires familiarity both with their “home” culture and with the dominant culture. For white students, cultural competence requires that they recognize their culture as a culture, and not as the sole or universal “right” way of being. Musical value judgments are neither objective nor politically neutral. Music education has a history of defining musical excellence to uplift European cultural norms and to disparage or demean other practices. In the nineteenth century, Western European culture was the hegemonic cornerstone of American education. “Cultural uniformity was accepted without question, and the dissenting voices of women and minorities were more or less silent. Notions of the good, the true, and the beautiful could be described with relative surety” (Jorgensen, 2003, p. 2). Textbooks still tend to describe canonical masterpieces as “universal, timeless, and valid under all circumstances,” not as “one solution or one aspect,” but as speaking “to all peoples” (Lang, 1997, p. 38). However, the massive popularity of rap and dance music among white listeners is evidence that the norms of the Western canon are not even universal among European-​descended Americans, much less among everyone else. Because so much popular music derives from Black culture, teaching it can stimulate long-​overdue challenges to curricular Eurocentrism.

16.7. The Racial Politics of Music Education It is impossible to talk about music education in the United States without engaging our country’s racial politics. The term “American popular music” is substantially “a euphemism for Afro-​American popular musics” (Feld, 1988, p. 31). Our “high” musical culture has followed Europe’s lead in distinguishing between “elite” and “popular” music, with popular implicitly equated to both “low” and “Black” (Middleton, 2000, p. 60). For

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evidence, consider how many decades it took before universities were willing to consider jazz to be an “art” music. While Duke Ellington appears on a state quarter now, during his own period of peak fame, cultural authorities barely considered jazz to be music at all, much less a valid form worthy of serious consideration. While our attitudes toward Black music have improved over the years, music education continues to be dominated by whiteness, both demographically and in terms of curriculum content. The student population of American public schools is now majority people of color (National Center for Education Statistics, 2019), but music educators are overwhelmingly white (Elpus & Abril, 2011) and are more likely than their students to come from suburban, low-​poverty areas (Doyle, 2014). University music education programs emphasize the competencies of the European classical tradition almost exclusively. A study of the undergraduate music education program at a major American university found that students spent 93% of course time on Western “art” music, as opposed to the 0.5% of course time spent on all forms of popular music (Wang & Humphries, 2009, p. 25). Adam Kruse (personal communication, 2018) pointed out that while Kendrick Lamar is a good enough musician to merit a Pulitzer Prize, he would not be accepted into most undergraduate music education programs. We have plenty of work left to do.

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16.8. Music Creation as Personal Development We talk about our favorite songs as if they are people. To love a song this way is to imbue it with a kind of “ethical personhood,” to behave toward it like we do “when we constitute others as persons, or when we invest others with personhood” (Elliott & Silverman, 2015, p. 190). In so doing, we also construct our own personhood. Music is “a technology of the self” (DeNora, 1999). It’s a critical tool for building individual and group identity, for finding a sense of belonging. Our adolescent students are struggling to find their place in their peer group and in the larger world, and they play out a lot of that struggle through music. It offers them relief from anger, depression, anxiety, and isolation. For some young people, that relief may be literally lifesaving (Campbell et al., 2007). Musical creativity is serious business. Any kind of music participation has potential emotional benefits. But electronic dance music and hip-​hop have qualities that make them especially valuable. Dance grooves support the kind of bodily entrainment that can alleviate anxiety. Grooves give performers “a sense of relaxation and surety that facilitates expression and imagination” (Pressing, 2002, p. 290). The same is true for listeners. While a drum machine pattern may seem limiting in its rigidity, that same predictability is liberating, because “the comfort and familiarity it provides allows the participants to engage in rhythmically intense, life-​affirming, and expressive musicing that invites movement” (Lightstone, 2012, p. 48). Hip-​hop goes a step further, because it combines participatory grooves with a lyrical style that favors marginalized voices and autobiographical truth-​telling. Hip-​hop is not (only) a music genre; it’s “a distinct worldview with related sensibilities and epistemologies that can inform teaching and learning” (Petchauer, 2011, p. 1412). The hip-​hop aesthetic is an adaptation to the urban environment, particularly as experienced by poor and working-​class people of color. It’s a cultural space that “allows for the development of a privileged everyday life [for] those who do not have one and for the

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opportunity to better improve and make sense of the chaos (e.g., violence, marginalization, subordination, oppression) that is, for many, everyday life” (Schneider, 2011, p. 5). Beyond its formal musical innovations, hip-​hop represents an outlook on social and economic organization, one that emphasizes making the most of what’s at hand, of speaking your own truths, and of staying emotionally connected in the face of economic and social obstacles. The hip-​hop ethos has potential to transform the teaching and creation of other kinds of music as well.

16.9. Building for Musical Lifetimes We hope that our students will continue their musical lives after they leave school. We owe it to them, and to the society of which they will soon be a part, to foster lifelong engagement, to “invite people to begin or extend their musical growth at any age or stage” (Myers, 2008, p. 3). Self-​taught pop musicians find it easier to maintain continuity of their musical lives from adolescence into adulthood than do participants in teacher-​ directed ensembles (Pitts, 2017). By teaching music production, we provide students with a toolkit to pursue a broader variety of musical activity across a broader variety of circumstances. Jacques Attali (1985) described self-​directed amateur musical creativity as a way to “create our own relation with the world and [to] try to tie other people into the meaning we thus create. . . . A concept such as this seems natural in the context of music. But it reaches far beyond that; it relates to the emergence of the free act, self-​transcendence, pleasure in being instead of having” (p. 134). Helping students learn to find pleasure in being instead of having is our best hope for freeing them from the hedonic treadmill of consumerism, and for helping them to imagine alternatives. We hope you will join us on this liberatory journey. Thank you for reading.

References Attali, J. (1985). Noise: The political economy of music. University of Minnesota Press. Bell, A. P. (2016). The process of production | The production of process: The studio as instrument and popular music pedagogy. In R. Wright (Ed.), 21st century music education: Informal learning and non-​formal teaching approaches in school and community contexts (pp. 243–​262). Canadian Music Educators’ Association. Bowman, W. D. (2004). “Pop” goes . . . ? Taking popular music seriously. In C. X. Rodriguez (Ed.), Bridging the gap: Popular music and music education (pp. 29–​49). MENC: The National Association for Music Education. Campbell, P. S., Connell, C., & Beegle, A. (2007). Adolescents’ expressed meanings of music in and out of school. Journal of Research in Music Education, 55(3), 220–​236. Cavicchi, D. (2009). My music, their music, and the irrelevance of music education. In T. A. Regelski & J. T. Gates (Eds.), Music education for changing times (pp. 97–​107). Springer Science+Business Media. Denora, T. (1999). Music as a technology of the self. Poetics, 27(1), 31–​56. Doyle, J. L. (2014). Cultural relevance in urban music education: A synthesis of the literature. Applications of Research in Music Education, 32(2), 44–​51. Elliott, D. J., & Silverman, M. (2015). Music matters: A philosophy of music education (2nd ed.). Oxford University Press.

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Elpus, K., & Abril, C. R. (2011). High school music ensemble students in the United States: A demographic profile. Journal of Research in Music Education, 59(2), 128–​145. Feld, S. (1988). Notes on world beat. Public Culture, 1(1), 31–​37. Gilroy, P. (1993). The Black Atlantic: Modernity and double consciousness. Verso Books. Hugill, A. (2012). The digital musician (2nd ed.). Routledge. Jorgensen, E. R. (2003). Transforming music education. Indiana University Press. Kennedy, J. F. (October 3, 1963). Remarks in Heber Springs, Arkansas, at the dedication of Grers Ferry Dam. The American Presidency Project, UC Santa Barbara. Kratus, J. (2019). On the road to popular music education: The road goes on forever. In Z. Moir, B. Powell, & G. D. Smith (Eds.), The Bloomsbury handbook of popular music education: Perspectives and practices (pp. 455–​463). Bloomsbury Publishing. Labaree, D. F. (1997). Public goods, private goods: The American struggle over educational goals. American Educational Research Journal, 34(1), 39–​81. Ladson-​Billings, G. (2015). You gotta fight the power: The place of music in social justice education. In C. Benedict, P. Schmidt, G. Spruce, & P. G. Woodford (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of social justice in music education (pp. 406–​419). Oxford University Press. Lang, P. H. (1997). Music and history. In A. Mann & G. Buelow (Eds.), Musicology and performance (pp. 24–​39). Yale University Press.

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Lightstone, A. J. (2012). The importance of hip-​hop for music therapists. In S. Hadley & G. Yancy (Eds.), Therapeutic uses of rap and hip-​hop (pp. 39–​56). Routledge. Middleton, R. (2000). Musical belongings: Western music and its low-​other. In G. Born & D. Hesmondhalgh (Eds.), Western music and its others: Difference, representation, and appropriation in music (pp. 59–​85). University of California Press. Myers, D. E. (2008). Lifespan engagement and the question of relevance: Challenges for music education research in the twenty-​first century. Music Education Research, 10(1), 1–​14. National Center for Education Statistics. (2019). Status and trends in the education of racial and ethnic groups. United States Institute of Education Sciences. Petchauer, E. (2011). I feel what he was doin’: Responding to justice-​oriented teaching through hip-​hop aesthetics. Urban Education, 46(6), 1411–​1432. Pitts, S. (2017). What is music education for? Understanding and fostering routes into lifelong musical engagement. Music Education Research, 19(2), 160–​168. Pressing, J. (2002). Black Atlantic rhythm: Its computational and transcultural foundations. Music Perception, 19(3), 285–​310. Regelski, T. (2016). Music, music education, and institutional ideology: A praxial philosophy of musical sociality. Action, Criticism & Theory for Music Education, 15(2), 10–​45. Reimer, B. (2009). Seeking the significance of music education: Essays and reflections. R&L Education. Rodriguez, C. X. (2004). Popular music in music education: Toward a new conception of musicality. In C. X. Rodriguez (Ed.), Bridging the gap: Popular music and music education (pp. 13–​27). MENC: The National Association for Music Education. Schneider, C. J. (2011). Culture, rap music, “bitch,” and the development of the censorship frame. American Behavioral Scientist, 55(1), 36–​56. Snead, J. A. (1984). Repetition as a figure of Black culture. In H. L. Gates (Ed.), Black literature and literary theory (3rd ed., pp. 59–​79). Taylor & Francis Group. Titon, J. T., & Fujie, L. (2005). Worlds of music: An introduction to the music of the world’s peoples, Volume 1. Cengage Learning. Turino, T. (2008). Music as social life: The politics of participation. University of Chicago Press.

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Wang, J. C., & Humphreys, J. T. (2009). Multicultural and popular music content in an American music teacher education program. International Journal of Music Education, 27(1), 19–​36. Wilson, O. (2001). “It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing”: The relationship between African and African American music. In S. Walker (Ed.), African roots/​American cultures: Africa in the creation of the Americas (pp. 153–​168). New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

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275

INDEX Tables and figures are indicated by t and f following the page number. Ableton Learning Music site, 115, 115f Ableton Link, 240 Ableton Live, xv, xviii, 13, 40–​45, 230 arpeggiators, 154, 155f Arrangement View, 41–​42, 60, 67–​68, 68f, 132, 143–​144, 164, 165f, 208 Arranging Clips project, 69–​70 audio-​to-​MIDI function, 190, 190f Beat Repeat effect, 41 Beats mode, 41 browser, 70, 113f, 184 chord clips, 151–​152, 151f chunking, 8 clicking and dragging clips, 70, 73, 77 clip launching, 42 color-​coding clips, 141 compared to other DAWs, 44–​45 Complex mode, 41 creating default sessions, 69–​70, 134, 135f creating new Drum Rack, 125, 149 disconnecting and reconnecting audio interfaces, 75, 79 DMX lighting, 242, 243f dragging clips, 70 drones, 179 Drum Buss effect, 152 Duplicate feature, 132 duplicating clips, 138, 140 808 Core Kit preset, 168 808 drum kits, 152, 168, 170 electronic style, 41 elongating clips, 163 enabling sessions with many tracks, 102 experimenting with groove structures, 128 exporting, 72 Follower button, 98, 98f Frequency Shifter device, 191 Gate device, 191, 191f Glue Compressor, 153, 153f Help menu, 72 importing visual media, 179, 184 Intro-​compatible Live Packs, 70 lining up dialogue recording, 103, 104f loop library, 66–​67 Loopmasters Mixtape pack, 70 Loopmasters Pack, 131 making chords from single note, 106, 150, 150f melodies, 143f

MIDI controllers, 31 missing files, 79, 193, 208 Mute button, 71–​72 Note mode, 136 pitched and unpitched instruments, 113, 113f Pitch MIDI device, 152 preloading with template, 158, 167 progress bars, 65f project folders, 71, 79, 215 purpose and functionality of, 40–​41 Push and, 42–​44 Redux device, 191–​192 response time, 41 Scale effect, 181, 182f scenes vs. abstractions, 59 Session View, 41–​43, 60, 63, 67–​68, 68f, 128, 131–​132, 164, 164f Set 1.1.1 command, 85, 98, 204, 206 sidechain compression, 153 Simpler instrument, 89–​90, 155, 190, 193, 209 Singing C preset, 149 Solo button, 71–​72 Sub808Bass preset, 152, 170 syncing guide tracks, 98–​100, 98f syncing remixes, 85–​86 syncing samples, 204, 205f tempo-​aligning, 85 Tempo Leader mode, 98–​99, 98f Texture mode, 41 time-​stretching algorithms, 41 Tones mode, 41 transport icons, 62, 63f–​64f transposing, 152, 164 warping, 86, 86f, 88, 92, 207 Ableton Push, 40, 42–​44 Accent button, 149 adding loops, 131 advantages of, 43 Automation recording, 132 buildup, 163 changing default settings, 128 chords, 44, 106–​107, 108f, 136, 136f–​137f, 138, 139f, 150–​151, 161, 162f Chromatic mode, 151 clip launching, 43 criticisms of, 25, 40 demonstrating usage of, 128 detached listener stance, 43 Double Loop feature, 142

276

Index

276 

Ableton Push (cont.) drones, 179 Drum Rack mode, 125, 160 drum sequencing, 44, 129, 140, 160, 168–​169 experimenting with groove structures, 128 Fixed Length feature, 135, 138, 142, 145, 165 goal of, 43 improvisation, 43–​44 KitCore 909, 160 listening back to clips, 161 melodies, 44, 134, 142–​143 MIDI controllers, 31 music theory and, 138 music under dialogue, 108f Note mode, 136, 150–​151 Note Repeat feature, 125, 155, 167 pad layout, 124, 159 pitch for bass instruments, 159 recording, 132 scales, 138, 142, 145, 150, 165, 170, 181–​182, 182f snare rolls, 154 switching modes, 124, 164 workstation placement, 35f Ableton User Groups, 230 Abril, Carlos, 23 acapella libraries of tracks, 227 remixing, 56, 83–​89, 84f, 88f, 213 stems, 91 successful project formula, 56 action cues, 105–​106, 106f Adams, John, 8 ad-​blocking browser extensions, 208 administrators, 19–​20 board of education, 19 director of curriculum, 20 principal, 20 superintendent, 20 treasurer, 20 winning over, 20–​21 Adobe Premiere, 195 ADR (Automated Dialog Replacement), 103 advanced students promoting program, 21 repeating course, 23 student-​led groups, 247 updating elements of program, 227 “Africa” (Toto), 186–​187 African-​Americans and African diaspora attrition rate of Black students, 23 musical genres and culture, 52, 100–​101, 228, 267, 269–​270 technology and, 177 Afrojack, 149 afterschool activities. See extracurricular and afterschool activities Airdrop, 197 Akai MPC, 44

Allen, Joanna, 250f “All Is Full of Love” (Björk), 82–​83 “All My Heroes” (Bleachers), 96 “All That” (Carly Rae Jepsen), 134 “All This” (Point Point), 147 “Alright” (Kendrick Lamar), 100–​101 “Amateur” (Lasse Gjertsen), 195, 200 Android File Transfer app, 197 “Another One Bites the Dust” (Queen), 205f Antares Auto-​Tune, 228 Aphex Twin, xvii, 179 APME (Association of Popular Music Educators), 230 applause, 219, 225, 263 Apple Final Cut Pro, 195 Apple Logic Pro, 41–​42, 230 compared to Ableton Live, 45 disconnecting and reconnecting audio interfaces, 76 Live Looping, 63 loop library, 70 Apple Music, 54, 63f, 263 aQWERTYon, 107, 181 “Archangel” (Burial), 148 “Are You My Woman (Tell Me So)” (Chi-​Lites), 203 Armstrong, Louis, 9 arpeggiators, 30, 30f, 59, 130, 135, 138, 140, 140f–​ 141f, 154, 155f Arrangement View (Live), 41–​42, 67–​68, 68f. See also Ableton Live activating arrangement, 164 recording to, 60, 132, 143, 164, 165f, 208 unlocking, 132, 144 when to use, 68 Arranging Clips project, 69–​74 assessment strategies, 74 concept, 69 DAW basics, 70–​71 day-​by-​day plan, 70–​73 differentiated instruction, 73 duration, 69 during work time, 74 exporting, 72–​73 listening examples, 69 loops, 70 mixing, 70–​71 preparation, 69–​70 project design, 70 saving, 72–​73 technical and creative goals, 69 troubleshooting, 73 turning in projects, 72–​74 Art of Noise, The, xvii, 186, 188f Art of Noticing, The (Walker), 253 Askerøi, Eirik, 92 Attali, Jacques, 271 audio-​centered project design, 62–​111 Arrangement View, 67–​68, 68f Arranging Clips project, 69–​74

277

Index Custom Cover Song project, 96–​101 editing audio, 64, 66 intersection with other types of projects, 178f loops, 62, 66–​67, 67f Movie Soundtrack project, 101–​111 Picking Apart a Multitrack project, 90–​95 recording audio, 63–​64 Session View, 67–​68, 68f Simple Remix project, 82–​90 timeline, 62, 65f transport icons, 62, 63f–​64f Unreliable Product Ad project, 75–​80 Austen, Jane, 83 Automated Dialog Replacement (ADR), 103 Automator, 38, 38f autotelicism, 5 Avid Pro Tools, 13, 42, 44–​45, 230   B., Howie, 83 Bach, Johann Sebastian, 15 “Back Home” (Caribou), 134 backlines, 238–​239, 239f “Bad and Boujee” (Migos), 167 “Bad Guy” (Billie Eilish), 195 Balasubrahmanyam, S. P., 201 “Bam Bam” (Sister Nancy), 204 “Bam Bam” (Toots Hibbert), 204 Bamberger, Jeanne, 50 Bandcamp, 214, 236, 263 Beach Boys, The, 14 “Beat It” (Michael Jackson), 93 Beatles, The, 14, 92, 94, 99, 142 Beatles: Rock Band game, 91 Beatmaking project, 127–​133 adding loops, 131–​132, 131f assessment strategies, 133 basic drumming in DAWs, 129 day-​by-​day plan, 129–​132 differentiated instruction, 133 duration, 127 during work time, 133 hi-​hat cymbal, 130–​131, 131f kick drum, 130, 130f listening examples, 127 preparation, 127–​128 project design, 128 recording, 132 snare drum or clap backbeats, 129–​130, 129f technical and creative goals, 57–​58, 127 troubleshooting, 132 Beats headphones, 28 Bee Gees, 55 Bell, Adam, 13, 266 “Bells of Cologne” (Imaginary Cities), 82 Benassi, Benny, 148 Benassi Bros, 158 Bennett, Brandon, 173 Besemer, Susan, 175

Beyoncé, 114, 203 BHAD BHABIE, 167 Big Chocolate, 148 “Billie Jean” (Michael Jackson), 118, 120, 121f “birdie,” 155 Bitwig GmbH Bitwig Studio, 42, 45 Björk, 9, 82–​83, 96, 227 Blackman, Toni, 238 Bleachers, 96 Blink-​182, 236 “Blue Milk” (Big Chocolate), 148 blues, 52, 83 Blues Brothers, The (film), 235 Boards of Canada, 186 “Bodak Yellow” (Cardi B), 167 Bomb Squad, The, xvii Bowie, David, 85, 95 Brown, James, 118, 127, 203–​205 buildup, 163–​165, 163f–​164f Burial, 148 Burtt, Ben, 104 Byrne, David, 9   Cage, John, 221 Cambridge Music Technology, 91 Campbell, Joseph, 263 “Can You Party” (Royal House), 158 Cardi B, 167 Caribou, 134 Carnage & Milo & Otis, 148 Cash, Johnny, 96 Cast Away (film), xviii cellos, 116 “Chamber of Reflection” (Mac DeMarco), 134 “Chameleon” (Herbie Hancock), 118, 121f cheater tracks. See guide tracks Chemical Brothers, The, xvii ChilledCow YouTube channel, 186 “Chimes” (Hudson Mohawke), 148 chords Ableton Live, 106, 150, 150f, 151–​152, 151f Ableton Push, 44, 106–​107, 108f, 136, 136f–​137f, 138, 139f, 150–​151, 161, 162f Future Bass project, 150–​152, 150f–​151f Slow Jam project, 136, 136f–​137f, 138, 139f–​140f chunking, 8, 50 Churchill, Winston, 229 CHVRCHES, 96 “Cinema” (Benny Benassi), 148 clapping applause, 219, 225, 263 Beatmaking project, 129 Trap Beats project, 168, 170 Clarke, Arthur C., 215 classical music, 8, 25, 54, 155 “Close (To The Edit)” (Art of Noise), 268 “Coat of Arms” (Nosaj Thing), 148 Cockos Reaper, 45

277 

278

Index

278 

Coldcut, 83 computers. See also digital audio workstations; equipment GPUs, 28 Mac vs. PC, 28 maintenance, 38 replacing, 37 as tool vs. as medium, 13 type to choose, 27–​28 USB ports and hubs, 28 congenital amusia (tone deafness), 6 Connections (TV show), 229 conservatories, 6, 8, 25, 266 constructivism, 4, 9, 12–​13, 50–​51 copy/​cut-​and-​paste aesthetic, 8, 15–​17 copyright, 16–​17, 83, 268 CORE Music Program, 237 “Core Values, The” (Meade), 257f Cosm, Tom, xv “Could I Be” (Sylvan Esso), 195 COVID-​19 pandemic, xvii, xix, 229–​230, 252f, 260–​261, 264 craftsmanship, 4 “Crazy in Love” (Beyoncé), 203 Create Digital Music, 230 creative deviation projects, 175–​216 Final project, 211–​216 finding unique voice, 177–​178, 178f intersection with other types of projects, 178f irreverence, 176 repurposing existing ideas, 177 Sampling project, 201–​210 Soundscape project, 178–​185 teaching originality, 175–​176 Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop project, 186–​194 Video Beatboxing project, 194–​200 Creative Product Analysis Matrix, 175 creativity, 3. See also creative deviation projects; music project design assessing and grading, 175 balancing with constraints, 51 creative prompts, 12 creative teachers, 3–​5 creative types, 253, 254f–​255f electronic music creativity missing from music education, xvii–​xviii flow and, 5 improvisation, 43 music creation as personal development, 270 redeployment, reconception, and re-​creation, 177 room configurations and, 32 teaching originality, 175–​176 technological, 177 tinkering approach, 51 traditional vs. new, 175 critical listening, 6–​7, 14–​15, 224 deconstructing genres, 59 defined, 92

Picking Apart a Multitrack project, 91–​93 recording quality, 79 Sampling project, 203 stems and multitracks, 91–​92 “Cry Me A River” (Justin Timberlake), 195 Csíkszentmihályi, Mihály, 5, 49 cultural considerations, 7, 100–​101, 266 educational goals and social impact, 269 elevating culture, 267 racial politics of music education, 269–​270 technological creativity, 177 Custom Cover Song project, 96–​101 cultural considerations, 100–​101 duration, 96 listening examples, 96 matching other instruments to vocals, 99–​ 100, 100f preparation, 96–​97 recording vocal/​other instruments, 99, 99f syncing guide track, 98–​100, 98f technical and creative goals, 96 technique, 97 cyphers, 236, 268   Daft Punk, xvii–​xviii, 127, 158, 228 DAMN (Kendrick Lamar), 7 dance music, 8–​9, 265, 267–​270 advances in pop led by dance producers, 14 basslines, 160, 161f buildup, 163 FL Studio, 45 four-​on-​the-​floor rhythm, 130 Future Bass project, 148–​149 loop-​centricity, 8, 66 microgenres, 149 as participatory music, 269 remixing, 15, 82 sampling, 16 swing, 124 tying new or emerging genres back to something canonical, 55 “Dan Dare” (The Art of Noise), xvii Danger Mouse, 82 Darude, 158 Daughter, 134, 212 Davis, Miles, 207 DAWs. See Ableton Live; digital audio workstations “Dayvan Cowboy” (Boards of Canada), 186 Deadmau5, 158 decolonizing philosophy, 60–​61 De La Soul, 201 DeliFB, 148 DeMarco, Mac, 134 Depeche Mode, 159 DeSantis, Dennis, 88, 145 “Desert Suite” (Brad Fiedel), 186 dialogue lining up recording, 103, 104f

279

Index merging with movie, 107, 109f–​110f Movie Soundtrack project, 103, 107 music under, 107–​108, 108f recording, 76–​77, 103, 110 Unreliable Product Ad project, 76–​77 “Diamonds Dub (Tangoterje Edit)” (Todd Terje), 82 “digging the crates,” 205–​206 digital audio workstations (DAWs). See also Ableton Live adding clips, 71 basic editing functions, 66 custom default sessions, 69–​70 deleting clips, 71 disconnecting and reconnecting audio interfaces, 76, 79, 108 dragging clips to tracks, 70–​71, 73 exporting, 72–​73 Help menu, 72 loop libraries, 70 loops, 15, 62, 73 maintenance, 38 MIDI controllers, 31 Mute button, 72 removing clips and tracks, 71 saving projects, 71 Solo button, 71–​72 timeline/​progress bar, 62, 70 transport icons, 70 visualization systems, 13–​14 volume, 71 digital clipping, 71 Digital Performer, 42, 45, 230 Dillon, Steve, 5, 261 disco four-​on-​the-​floor rhythm, 130 house music and, 159–​160 producer’s medium, 9 remixing, 83 tying new or emerging genres back to something canonical, 55 Discovery (Daft Punk), 127 Disquiet Junto, 262–​263 DJ Shadow, xviii, 127 DJ TechTools MIDI Fighter 3D, 31f DMXis, 242, 242f DMX lighting, 239–​242, 240f–​242f Dr. Dre, 51 “Documentary Style” (Allen), 250f Donuts (J Dilla), 127, 186 Dorsey, Lee, 201 Double Exposure, 83 “Do You Feel Like We Do” (Peter Frampton), 228 Dragonball Z (TV show), 212 Drake, 9, 167, 201, 207 Drake Road Productions, 247–​248, 249f drones, 57, 161f, 179–​181, 183–​185 drop defined, 14, 150

Future Bass project, 58, 150, 152, 154–​155 House Music project, 159, 163, 164f, 165 Trap Beats project, 171, 171f–​172f drumming stations, 34 drum programming, 113 Ableton Push, 44, 129, 140, 160, 168–​169 Trap Beats project, 168–​170 Drum Programming project, 117–​126 assessment strategies, 126 beatmaking, 124 day-​by-​day plan, 118–​125 differentiated instruction, 125–​126 duration, 117 during work time, 126 Groove Pizza, 118–​124, 119f–​123f listening examples, 118 preparation, 118 refining patterns, 125 technical and creative goals, 117 troubleshooting, 125 dubstep, xv, 149, 227 anecdotal timeline of project involving, 55–​56 FM synthesis, 55 Future Bass project, 148 technical rationales for projects, 55 Ducker device, 159, 162–​163 Dukes, Frank, 15 Dumbo (film), 229 duration, 50, 116 Dwele, 268   Eccojams Vol. 1 (Daniel Lopatin), 186 eight-​bar phrasing, 60, 72–​73, 72f, 135, 143, 144f, 163, 192, 208 Eilish, Billie, 195 Electronic Music Group (EMG), 227, 237–​247, 257 birth of, 237–​238 community shows, 246 equipment, 238–​242, 239f–​243f, 243t live sets, 244–​245 mashup temp tracks, 245 performance opportunities, 238 school shows, 245 student’s perspective, 244–​245, 244f electronic music school. See music technology programs Ellington, Duke, 270 Elliott, Missy, 8, 207 Elpus, Kenneth, 23 EMG. See Electronic Music Group Empire Strikes Back, The (film), 102 Endtroducing . . . (DJ Shadow), xviii, 127 Eno, Brian, 4, 40 equipment, xxvi, 27–​39 cameras, 33–​34 cleaning, 37–​38 computers, 27–​28, 37 headphones, 28, 29f, 36

279 

280

Index

280 

equipment (cont.) maintenance, 37–​38 microphones, 37 MIDI controllers, 28, 30–​31, 30f–​31f, 37 professional vs. prosumer, 24–​25 replacing, 24 screens, 32 speakers, 32 studio racks, 37 synthesizers, 37 trackpads vs. mice, 37 Eric B. & Rakim, 82–​83 Esso, Sylvan, 195 eTech Ohio conference, 237 Etmans, Kelsee, 209f, 244f Everyday Tonality (Tagg), 114, 135 extended remixes, 83 extracurricular and afterschool activities, 235–​246 Electronic Music Group, 237–​246 house bands, 236 preparing students for independence, 235 recording clubs, 235–​236 extrinsic motivation, 218–​219 “Eye Know” (De La Soul), 201   fades, 53, 60, 145 Fairlight CMI, 191 “Famous” (Kanye West), 204 Fantano, Anthony, 221 feedback, xv, xviii, 214, 223 Final project, 214 flow and, 5 haptic feedback, 43 immediate, 8, 13, 224 online lessons, 261–​263 peer feedback, 219, 224–​225 proactively asking for, 126, 215 student-​led groups, 251–​253 “Feel It Still” (Portugal. The Man), 82 Fennell, Anne, 246 Fiedel, Brad, 186 Final Cut Pro, 195 Final project, 211–​216 assessment strategies, 215–​216 brainstorming, 212–​213 conferences, 213 day-​by-​day plan, 212–​214 duration, 211 during work time, 215 facilitating, 213–​214 feedback, 214 final showcase, 214 goals, 211 independent work, 213–​214 managing expectations, 214 project design, 211 troubleshooting, 214–​215 Finney, John, 8

Flack, Roberta, 96 “Floral Shoppe” (Macintosh Plus), 186–​187, 188f flow, 5, 49 FL Studio. See Image-​Line FL Studio Flume, 147, 149 Foley, 103–​105, 107–​108 Foley, Jack, 104 folk music, 83, 228, 268 Fouché, Rayvon, 177 four-​on-​the-​floor rhythm, xviii, 55, 118, 119f, 124, 130, 130f, 140, 159–​160, 160f frame-​level editing, 195–​196 Frampton, Peter, 228 Franklin, Aretha, 207 Freedman, Barb, 114 freesound.org, 75 frequency shifters, 191 Frozen (film), 213 Fugees, The, 96 funk, 15, 52, 127, 130, 160 Funk, Inc., 268 “Funky Drummer Parts One and Two, The” (James Brown), 118, 203 Future, 59 future bass, 227 Future Bass project, 147–​157 assessment strategies, 157 “birdie,” 155 chord clips, 150–​152, 151f chords, 150, 150f connecting sections, 156 day-​by-​day plan, 149–​156 differentiated instruction, 157 duration, 147 during work time, 157 808 bass, 152 future beats, 149 genre deconstruction, 117 listening examples, 147–​148 preparation, 148 project design, 148–​149 quiet versions of loud parts, 154 sidechain compression, 153, 153f snare rolls, 154–​155, 155f technical and creative goals, 147 troubleshooting, 156 voice chops, 155–​156 Future Sound of London, xvii, xviii, 186, 188f fuzzy boundaries, 144, 192   Gallop/​Clifton Strengths Tests, 253 GarageBand, xviii, 41–​42, 45, 67, 87, 114, 183, 215, 230 default session MIDI track, 112 disconnecting and reconnecting audio interfaces, 75 drones, 179 exporting, 72 loop library, 66, 70

281

Index project folders, 71 “Vintage Funk Kit 03” loop, 15 Garcia, Luis-​Manuel, 127 gated reverb, 191, 229 Gates, Henry Louis, 52 Genesis, 229 “Get Out of My Life, Woman” (Lee Dorsey), 201 Getz, Stan, xv Ghostbusters (film), 102 “Ghosts n Stuff” (Deadmau5), 158 Gibbons, Walter, 83 “Give It Up Or Turnit A-​Loose” (James Brown), 127 “Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof off the Sucker)” (Parliament), 127 Gjertsen, Lasse, 195–​196, 200 glue70, 186, 189 “Go!” (M83), 134 Google Classroom, 72 Google Drive, 197, 215 gospel, 160, 173 GPUs (graphics processing units), 28 graduation requirements, 23 Grahame-​Smith, Seth, 83 Grey Album, The (Danger Mouse), 82 groove defined, 127 groove-​level listening, 127–​128 Groove Pizza, 118–​124 circular grid, 118, 119f “It’s A Trap” preset, 168, 169f linear grid, 118 overview of, 118 “Planet Funk” template, 120, 122f–​123f rhythm, 119, 120f Slices setting, 118 Swing parameter, 122, 124 syncopation, 120, 121f Trap Beats project, 168, 169f growth mindset, 49, 177, 219, 223 “Gucci Flip Flops” (BHAD BHABIE), 167 “Gucci Gang” (Lil Pump), 167 guide tracks (cheater tracks; scratch tracks) creating, 96 defined, 97 syncing, 98–​100, 98f Guitar Hero game, 91 Gustafson, Ruth, 23 Guthrie, Woody, 96   Hancock, Herbie, 118, 120, 228 Hanks, Tom, xviii “Harder Better Faster Stronger” (Daft Punk), 228 Harmon, 236 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (film), 102 Harvey, PJ, 9 headphones disposable covers, 37 frequency response, 28, 29f

hearing 808 bass, 171 maintenance, 37 replacing, 36 type to choose, 28 wired vs. wireless, 28 Hein, Ethan, xv–​xvi, xvii–​xix, xxiii, xxv, 3, 14, 22–​23, 34, 44, 49, 54–​56, 71, 73, 75–​76, 102, 111, 128, 133, 173, 218–​220, 223, 227, 230, 236, 238, 240, 265–​266 Beat Repeat effect, 41 breakbeats, 67, 202 critical listening, 224–​225 Disquiet Junto, 262–​263 fadeouts, 145 Groove Pizza, 118 guided listening, 93 online lessons, 262–​263 “Planet Funk” template, 120 remixes of “Starman,” 85 sampling, 203–​204, 211, 268 song form visualizations, 143, 167–​168 student-​led groups, 253 Western scales, 181 “You kids like the wrong music” meme, 26f Henke, Robert, 43 Hewitt, Michael, 114 Hibbert, Toots, 204 Hickman, Ella, 80 hi-​hat cymbals Beatmaking project, 130–​131, 131f Drum Programming project, 118, 120, 122, 124–​125 Future Bass project, 149 Groove Pizza, 118 Movie Soundtrack project, 106 Slow Jam project, 141 Trap Beats project, 169–​170 Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop project, 189, 191, 191f Video Beatboxing project, 199 Hill, Lauryn, 134, 204 hip-​hop. See also Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop project Beat Repeat effect, 41 criticisms of, 25, 265 cultural considerations, 101 cyphers, 236, 268 drop, 171 FL Studio, 45 freshness, 226 headphones, 28 improvisation, 237–​238 loops, 8, 127 online forums, 263 repurposing existing ideas, 177, 268 sampling, xviii, 16, 122, 206, 267 scratch tracks, 97 swing, 124 worldview, 101, 270–​271 Holiday, Billie, 9 Homogenic (Björk), 83 Horn, Trevor, 188f

281 

282

Index

282 

“Hotline Bling” (Drake), 201 Hot Rod (film), 195 house music, xviii. See also House Music project loops, 127 origin of, 159–​160 Roland TB-​303 synthesizer, 113 tempo, 87 tropes, 52, 55, 160 tying new or emerging genres back to something canonical, 55 House Music project, 158–​166 assessment strategies, 166 basslines, 160–​161, 161f, 164 buildup, 163, 163f–​164f day-​by-​day plan, 159–​164 differentiated instruction, 165 drop, 163, 164f drum patterns, 160, 160f duration, 158 during work time, 166 finishing touches, 164, 165f layering, 162, 162f listening examples, 158 preparation, 158 project design, 158–​159 software instruments vs. MIDI, 112–​113 synths, 160 technical and creative goals, 158 troubleshooting, 164–​165 voice shout, 163, 164f Houston, Whitney, 96 Howlin’ Wolf, 9 How to Be an Artist (Saltz), 253 Huang, Andrew, 195, 230 humor taxonomy, 76, 80, 81f Hunter, Christopher, 188f “Hurt” (Johnny Cash), 96 Hutton, Betty, 96 “Hyperactive” (Lasse Gjertsen), 195 hypermeter, 135 hypersaw, 150, 162   “I Feel So Fine” (Benassi Bros), 158 “Ill Flower” (Future Sound of London), 179 Image-​Line FL Studio, 42, 230 compared to Ableton Live, 45 drum programming, 120f loop library, 70 Imaginary Cities, 82 iMovie, 102, 185, 195–​196, 199–​200 “I’m Upset” (Drake), 167 inappropriate and explicit content, 59, 76, 79–​80, 167, 252–​253 Indaba.com, 15 Instagram, 182, 185, 254, 261 intellectual property, 83, 202–​203, 202f, 268 intrinsic motivation, 223–​224 iOS Photos app, 185 ISDN (Future Sound of London), xviii

“I Teach Music Technology” Facebook group, 230 “It’s a New Day” (Skull Snaps), 118, 122 “It’s Not Right But It’s Okay” (CHVRCHES), 96 “It’s Oh So Quiet” (Björk), 96 “It’s Your Move” (Diana Ross), 186–​187 iTunes, 4 “I Want You Back” (Jackson 5), 124   Jackson, Michael, 93, 118, 120, 121f, 207 Jackson 5, 124 Jay-​Z , 203 jazz, xv, 14–​15, 52, 135, 160, 267 harmony, 135 as participatory music, 268 racial politics, 270 remixing, 83 smooth, 188 swing, 124 “Jazz It Up” (Reel 2 Real), 158 J Dilla, 125, 127, 186, 189, 268 Jepsen, Carly Rae, 134 Jlin, 196 John, Elton, 141 “Jolene” (The White Stripes), 96 Jones, Quincy, 4 “Juice” (Lizzo), 82 Juice WRLD, 201 Jurassic Park (film), 102 “Just Hangin’ Out” (Main Source), 204   Kai, 147 Kennedy, John F., 265 Kent, Corita, 221 kick drums Beatmaking project, 130, 130f–​131f Drum Programming project, 118, 119f, 120, 122, 124–​126 Future Bass project, 149–​150, 152–​153, 156 House Music project, 159–​160, 163, 165–​166 Slow Jam project, 140 Trap Beats project, 169–​171 Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop project, 189–​190 Video Beatboxing project, 196, 198–​199 “Killing Me Softly” (The Fugees), 96 “King of the Beats” (Mantronix), 268 Kirn, Peter, 230 Kit Kat “City Steps” commercial, 195 Klein, Nicholas, 26 Knuckles, Frankie, 158, 160 Koetting, James, 268 “Kool Is Back” (Funk, Inc.), 268 Kruse, Adam, 270 Kuhn, Will, xv–​xvi, xvii–​xix, xxiii, xxv, 22, 32, 71–​72, 75–​77, 80, 88, 128, 132–​133, 135, 148, 154, 159, 167, 173, 196–​197, 202–​204, 210, 212, 216–​222, 227, 229, 236, 266 audio effects, 182–​183 backbeats, 124, 129–​130, 144 cheater tracks, 97

283

Index Drake Road Productions, 247–​248 Electronic Music Group, 228, 237–​238, 240, 242, 244–​247 listening to and observing students, 54–​56 movie clips, 102–​103, 111 online lessons, 261–​262 rethinking music education, 260 rubric sheet, 74, 225 “Session, Volume, Stop,” 164 student-​led groups, 247–​248, 256   lab space. See music lab space Lamar, Kendrick, 7, 100–​101, 270 Latin dance, 160 Lauper, Cyndi, 134 Lave, Jean, 236 Lebanon High School, xxiii, 80, 81f, 209f, 220, 236, 244f, 250f, 257f–​258f Led Zeppelin, 207 Legend of Zelda, The (video game), 187 “Let it Go” (Frozen soundtrack), 213 Levan, Larry, 160 “Light” (San Holo), 147 Lil Nas X, 167, 202 Lil Uzi Vert, 167 Lil Yachty, 167 Lizzo, 82, 212 Logic Pro. See Apple Logic Pro loops Arranging Clips project, 70 Beatmaking project, 131–​132, 131f defined, 66–​67, 127 enabling feedback, 8 house music, 127 introducing, 66–​67 libraries, 66–​67, 73 metaphor of the endless loop, 8 organizing by tempo, 66–​67, 67f popular music, 8, 127, 135 pyramid of, 127 royalty-​free, 15, 66 Sampling project, 205, 206f searching for, 73 tagging and organizing, 67, 67f techno, 127 third-​party libraries of, 15 understanding timeline before looping, 62 West African open-​ended loop form, 269 Lopatin, Daniel, 186 lost K-​Mart tape archive, 186–​187 “Lost Ones” (Lauryn Hill), 204 Loud in the Library, 238 low-​pass filtering, 189 Low With the Flow, 236 “Lucid Dreams (Forget Me)” (Juice WRLD), 201 Luv (Nujabes), 186   M|A|R|R|S, xvii Macintosh Plus, 186–​187, 188f

macOS, 28, 38, 38f, 65f, 73 Mad Lads, The, 201 Mad Professor, 83 Mai Lan, 134 Main Source, 204 “Make This Young Lady Mine” (The Mad Lads), 201 “Making a Good DJ Set” (Etmans), 209f Making Music (DeSantis), 88, 145 Mancuso, David, 159–​160 Mangeshkar, Lata, 201 Mantronix, 268 Markie, Biz, 9 Marrington, Mark, 13 Mars, Bruno, 195 “Mask Off” (Future), 59 Maslow, A., 27 master schedule, 22 Matrix, The (film), 41, 102 Matthieu, W. A., xv Max for Live, 153, 212 McCarthy, Jesse, 167 McCartney, Paul, 142 McClary, Susan, 8 McNeely, Jim, xv–​xvi Meade, Olivia, 257f Meaningful Engagement Matrix, 261, 262f M83, 134 Melton, Jeffry, 262 microphones cleaning, 37 disconnecting and reconnecting, 76, 79, 108 inner workings of, 64 professional vs. prosumer, 37 replacing, 37 MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) controllers, 28, 30–​31. See also Ableton Push adding variety through MIDI manipulation, 59 on-​board arpeggiators, 30, 30f Electronic Music Group, 238–​242 keys, 30 maintenance, 38 replacing, 37 touch-​sensitive pads, 30–​31, 30f–​31f MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) standard, 112. See also songwriting MIDI projects purpose of, 112 remixing MIDI files, 15 step time vs. real time, 113–​114 “Midnight Request Line” (Skream), 148 Midnight Star, 134 Migos, 167 Mitchell, Joni, 207 Mohawke, Hudson, 148–​149 “Moments in Love” (The Art of Noise), 186 Moog Sound Lab, 96 “Moombah” (Silvio Ecomo & Chuckie), 149 Moonrise Kingdom (film), 102 Morillo, Erick, 158

283 

284

Index

284 

Moroder, Giorgio, 159 Motown, 97 MOTU Digital Performer, 42, 45, 230 Movie Soundtrack project, 101–​111 assessment strategies, 110–​111 customizing, 111 day-​by-​day plan, 103–​107 differentiated instruction, 109–​110 duration, 101 during work time, 110 exporting, 107 Foley, 104–​105 importing clips, 103 merging music, dialogue, and movie, 107, 109f–​110f music cues, 105–​106, 106f–​108f pitching voices, 104 preparation, 102–​103 project design, 103 recording dialogue, 103 reviewing clips, 103 separate music project, 105 sound effects, 104–​105 technical and creative goals, 101–​102 terminology, 103 troubleshooting, 107–​108 Moylan, Bill, 92 Mr. Bill (Ableton tutorials by), xv multitracks defined, 91 finding, 90–​91 Picking Apart a Multitrack project, 90–​95 stems vs., 91 Musical Instrument Digital Interface. See also Ableton Push; MIDI controllers; MIDI standard; songwriting MIDI projects music education. See also music technology programs attrition rate of Black students, 23 authors’ experiences with, xviii–​xix building vs. undermining self-​confidence, 7 chunking, 8 competitions, 6 constructivism, 4, 9, 12–​13, 50–​51 contradictory goals, 6 cultural empowerment, 7 decline of, 3 electronic music creativity missing from, xvii–​xviii enrollment in, 23 equipment, xxvi, 27–​39 Eurocentrism of, 23 flow, 5 independent music teachers, xxv–​xxvi inventing from scratch, xvii learner agency, 4 learning musicianship, 6 music teachers’ vs. students’ definition of music, 8–​9

need for fresh ideas, xxvi popular music production, 5–​6 preparing students for musical lifetime, 271 psychological benefits of music creation, 4 public school teachers, xxv racial politics of, 269–​270 reasons for teaching music, 4–​5 self-​identity and self-​efficacy, 5, 7 students not participating or identifying with, 3, 5 teacher-​led ensemble model, 3–​4, 6 teaching what is popular outside of school, 265–​266 zone of proximal development, 9 music elements, 115 Music Experience Design Lab, 118, 181 music lab space, 31–​38 building on existing infrastructure, 34, 36 cleaning, 37–​38 collapsible lab space, 31–​32 dedicated space, 31–​32 individual stations, 34, 35f–​36f intimidation of managing computer labs, 221–​222 lighting, 32 maintenance, 37–​38 room configurations, 32–​33, 33f sharing space, 31 teaching location, 32–​33 music project assessment, 223–​225 critical listening, 224 grading creativity, 175 intrinsic motivation, 223–​224 practical considerations, 224–​225 rubric sheets, 74, 225, 225f music project design, 49–​61 adding variety through MIDI manipulation, 59 beginners, 49–​50 customization and personalization, 53 deconstructing genres, 59 eight-​bar phrases, 60 flow channel, 49 formula for successful projects, 56–​57 fuzzy boundaries and fill bars, 60 keeping list of required tropes for subgenres short, 55 knowing when to retire material, 55 listening to music students are listening to, 54 making songs end gracefully, 60 “music critics” vs. “average Joes.,” 54 music websites, 54 naming song sections, 60 pacing, 53 philosophy of, 50–​51 pop-​cultural ethnographic observation, 54–​56 Prime Directive decolonizing philosophy, 60–​61 process vs. product, 51–​53 Providing Default Tracks and Presets, 59 recording to Arrangement View, 60 sample timeline, 58–​59

285

Index scenes vs. abstractions, 59 strict-​to-​loose spectrum, 51, 53 technical and creative goals, 57–​59, 58t technical rationales for projects, 55 tying new or emerging genres back to something canonical, 55 universal techniques, 59–​60 music technology programs, 1, 217–​222. See also music education adapting to new teaching formats, 229–​230 attracting students who typically don’t take music classes, 5–​7 benefits of electronic production, 7–​8 benefits of for traditional music groups, 266–​267 committing to platforms, 230–​231 computer as tool vs. as medium, 13 creative prompts, 12 creative workshop structure, 3 critical popular music studies, 267–​268 criticisms of, 25–​26, 265 cross-​disciplinary nature of, 12 educational goals and social impact, 269 enabling feedback, 8 equipment, xxvi, 24–​25, 27–​39 fear of showing projects, 219–​220 fitting into performing arts curriculum, 7–​8 freshness, 226 funding, 23–​24 future-​proofing, 226–​231 graduation requirements, 23 inability to keep up, 222 independent music teachers, xxv–​xxvi intimidation of managing computer labs, 221–​222 lack of ideas for projects, 220 learning strategies used in pop music, 12 maintaining skills, 228 making fun of your past self, 227 master schedule and, 22 music department’s profile and, 22 need for fresh ideas, xxvi online lessons, 230, 260–​264 portfolio creation, 12–​13 presentational vs. participatory music, 268–​269 prioritizing sustainability, 227–​228 producers, 4 projects end too quickly, 218–​219 projects take too long, 217–​218 promoting student and teacher creativity, 3 public school teachers, xxv remixing, 15 sampling, 15–​17 songwriting, 14–​15 sound creation, 14–​15 staying relevant, 220–​221 teachers as drivers of, 19 updating project elements that involve choice, 227 weak student engagement, 217 winning over stakeholders, 19–​21

music theory, 114 Music Theory for Computer Musicians (Hewitt), 114 music therapy, 5   Nada, Dave, 149 National Public Radio ear training guide, 76 Native Instruments Komplete, 45 Native Instruments Maschine, 30f, 31 Navas, Eduardo, 83 Neely, Adam, xv–​xvi, 230 Netflix, 65f “Never Be Like You” (Flume), 147 New England Chamber of Commerce, 265 New York University (NYU), xvii–​xviii, 34, 118, 181, 237–​238 Nine Inch Nails, 95–​96, 202 No Country For Old Men (film), 102 Noisey, 54 No Protection (Mad Professor), 83 Nosaj Thing, 148 notation editors, 13 “Nothing Even Matters” (Lauryn Hill), 134 NPR, 236 Nujabes, 186 NYU (New York University), xvii–​xviii, 34, 118, 181, 237–​238 NYU IMPACT Conference, 237–​238   Odd Future, 236 Oddisee, 196 Odena, Oscar, 175 Odesza, 147 “Old Town Road” (Lil Nas X), 167, 202 “One” (Swedish House Mafia), 158 100 gecs, 95 Oneohtrix Point Never, 179 online forums, 263 online lessons, 230, 260–​264 asynchronous classes, 262–​263 live-​streaming sessions, 263 Meaningful Engagement Matrix, 261, 262f need to change everything, 260–​261 smaller groups, 262 synchronous classes that break into smaller groups, 262 O’Quin, Karen, 175 Original Concept, 268 OutKast, 118 “Owner of a Lonely Heart” (Yes), 268   “Paid in Full” (Eric B. & Rakim), 82–​83 Paradise Garage, 159 parents criticisms, 25 promoting program to, 21 Parliament, 127 Parton, Dolly, 96 pATCHES Pump device, 153, 153f

285 

286

Index

286 

“Peace” (Alison Wonderland), 147 peer feedback, 219, 224–​225 “Peg” (Steely Dan), 201 “Peter Piper” (RUN-​D.M.C.), 201 Pet Sounds (The Beach Boys), 14 P-​Funk, 127 Photek, xvii pianos grand piano tracks, 180–​181, 183 MIDI controller keyboards, 30–​31, 30f, 112, 136, 142 piano rolls, 15, 43, 129, 150, 161, 170, 196 Picking Apart a Multitrack project, 90–​95 assessment strategies, 95 customizing, 95 day-​by-​day plan, 93–​94 differentiated instruction, 94 duration, 90 during work time, 95 guided listening, 93 listening examples, 90–​91 mixing, 93–​94 preparation, 91–​92 presentations, 94 production analysis, 94 project design, 92–​93 technical and creative goals, 90 troubleshooting, 94 pitch, 50 adding variety through MIDI manipulation, 59 bass instruments, 159 pitch-​correction software, xviii–​xix pitched and unpitched instruments, 113, 113f pitching voices, 104 sound design, 116 Pitchfork, 54, 221 Police, The, 229 pop-​cultural ethnographic observation, 54–​56 importance of, 54 keeping list of required tropes for subgenres short, 55 knowing when to retire material, 55 listening to music students are listening to, 54 “music critics” vs. “average Joes,” 54 music websites, 54 technical rationales for projects, 55 tying new or emerging genres back to something canonical, 55 popular music, 266 accumulative form, 14 advances led by dance producers, 14 chords in loop-​based pop songs, 135 creative impact of technology, 9, 14 critical popular music studies, 267–​268 ever-​shifting definition of, 9 existing principally in recorded form, 9 headphones, 25 learning strategies used in, 12

loop-​centricity, 8 most important theory concepts for, 114 pyramid of loops, 127 reasons for teaching production of, 5–​6 schooled musicians and, 8 strong metronomic beat, 8 students composing “in their own style,” 5 vernacular codes, 8 Porcaro, Jeff, 93 portfolio creation, 12–​13 Portugal. The Man, 82 Powerpuff Girls, The (TV show), 203 Pressfield, Steven, 253 Pressing, Jeff, 267 “Pride” (Kendrick Lamar), 7 Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Grahame-​Smith), 83 Prime Directive, 60–​61, 218, 248 Princess Bride, The (film), 102 “Prison Song” (Selma), 59 Prodigy, The, xvii producers audio engineering, 116 computers, 13 consumers vs., 268 craftsmanship, 4 critical listening, 6, 91 “post-​performance” age, 9 remixing, 15, 83 sound creation, 14 thinking like, 7–​8, 206 today’s definition of, 4 project folders, 71, 79, 208 Propellerheads Reason, 45 Protection (Massive Attack), 83 Pro Tools, 13, 42, 44–​45, 230 Pump device, 153, 153f “Pump That Bass” (Original Concept), 268 “Pump Up the Volume” (M|A|R|R|S), xvii   Queen, 205f “Quiet Storm” (Smokey Robinson), 134   R&B, 100, 134–​135 Radiohead, 212 rap, xviii, 100–​101, 228, 267, 269 Ratatouille (film), 102 Reaper, 230 Reason, 230 “Recovery” (恢​复​) (2814), 179 Redding, Otis, 201 redux, 183, 191–​192 Reel 2 Real, 158 reflexive remixes, 83 regenerative remixes, 83 Reich, Steve, 8 remixing, 15. See also Simple Remix project acapella, 56, 83–​89, 84f, 88f, 213

287

Index copyright, 83 dance music, 15, 82 defined, 82 disco, 83 jazz, 83 producers, 15, 83 promoting creativity through, 15 Simple Remix project, 82–​90 syncing, 85–​86 types of, 83 Resnick, Mitchell, 51 “Revolution 909” (Daft Punk), 158 “RGV” (Carnage & Milo & Otis), 148 rhythm four-​on-​the-​floor rhythm, xviii, 55, 118, 119f, 124, 130, 130f, 140, 159–​160, 160f son clave, 119, 120f swing, 122, 124 tresillo rhythm, 118, 119f, 130, 140, 149–​151, 156, 169–​170 Rihanna, 15, 54 Riley, Winston, 204 Robinson, Porter, 147 Robinson, Smokey, 134 rock, 16, 41 cymbals, 145 Electronic Music Group, 237–​238, 245–​246 gated reverb, 229 music elements, 115 new wave rock, 229 online forums, 263 power ballads, 134–​135 repurposing existing ideas, 177 subgenres, 149 tempo, 85 Rock, Pete, xvii Rock Band game, 91 “Rockin’ Robin” (Jackson 5), 124 “Rockit” (Herbie Hancock), 228 Rock the Hill, 246 Rode NT-​USB microphone, 37 Roland TB-​303 synthesizer, xviii–​xix, 113 Roland TR-​808 drum machine, xviii, 44, 152 Roland TR-​909 drum machine, 44, 158, 160 Roosevelt, Franklin Delano, 229 Ross, Diana, 186–​187 Royal House, 158 rubric sheets, 74, 225, 225f RUN-​D.M.C., 118, 201 Ruthmann, Alex, 12   S, Robin, 158 Sade, 134 “Sad Machine” (Porter Robinson), 147 “Safe” (Petit Biscuit), 147 Saltz, Jerry, 253 sampling copyright, 16–​17, 268

cultural criticism, 16 dance music, 16 hip-​hop, xviii, 16, 122, 206, 267 promoting creativity through, 15–​17 techno, xviii Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop project, 188–​189, 189f Sampling project, 201–​210 assessment strategies, 210 creative repurposing, 177 day-​by-​day plan, 203–​208, 205f–​206f differentiated instruction, 209–​210 “digging the crates,” 205–​206 drums vs. not-​drums, 205, 206f duration, 201 during work time, 210 finishing touches, 207–​208, 208f “good” vs. “bad” sampling, 203–​204 intellectual property, 202–​203, 202f listening examples, 201–​202 organizing loops, 205, 206f preparation, 202 project design, 203 sync issues, 207 technical and creative goals, 201 troubleshooting, 208, 209f “Sandstorm” (Darude), 158 Sandy, 158 San Holo, 147 Saunders, Jo, 3, 235 Saville, Kirt, 8 Scott, Travis, 167 scratch tracks. See guide tracks scripts, 76, 77f selective remixes, 83 Selma (musical), 59 Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (The Beatles), 14 Session View (Live), 41–​42, 67, 68f. See also Ableton Live accidentally changing Launch Quantization in, 132 assembling projects, 164, 164f loops, 63, 131 performing live from, 60 pushing students to use, 128 Push touchpad layout and, 43 when to use, 68 “Shape Of My Heart” (Sting), 201 Sharon Jones and the Dap-​Kings, 96 Shazam, 216 “Show Me Love” (Robin S), 158 Sibelius, 13 “SICKO MODE” (Travis Scott), 167 sidechain compression, xv, 153, 153f, 159, 162, 187–​190 sidechain gates, 55, 187, 191, 191f Silvio Ecomo & Chuckie, 149 Simone, Nina, 9

287 

288

Index

288 

Simple Remix project, 82–​90 assessment strategies, 89 choosing song, 85–​86 customizing, 89–​90 day-​by-​day plan, 85–​88 differentiated instruction, 89 during work time, 82, 89 filling out, 87, 88f finishing touches, 88 listening examples, 82 marking up, 86 preparation, 82–​84, 84f project design, 84–​85 syncing, 86 technical and creative goals, 82 troubleshooting, 88 Simpsons, The (TV show), 187 “Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)” (Beyoncé), 114 Sister Nancy, 204 “(Sittin’ on) the Dock of the Bay” (Otis Redding), 201 Skream, 148 Skrillex, xv–​xvi, 148–​149 Skull Snaps, 118, 122 SLO (Student Learning Objective) guidelines, 74 “Slow Jam” (Midnight Star), 134 Slow Jam project, 134–​146 accompaniments, 138 assessment strategies, 146 bass, 138, 141f chords, 136, 136f–​137f, 138, 139f–​140f day-​by-​day plan, 136–​145 differentiated instruction, 146 drums, 140–​141 duration, 134 during work time, 146 empty space, 144 endings, 145 finishing touches, 144–​145, 144f fuzzy boundaries, 144 listening examples, 134 melodies, 141–​143, 143f noise-​based effects, 145 Note mode, 136 preparation, 134, 135f project design, 135 technical and creative goals, 134 troubleshooting, 145–​146 slow jams, 52–​53, 134 “Smokin’ Japanese Babe” (Future Sound of London), 186 “Smooth Operator” (Sade), 134 snare drums backbeats, 114, 133 Beatmaking project, 129–​130, 129f, 133 Drum Programming project, 119, 119f, 122, 124, 126 Future Bass project, 149, 154–​155, 155f

Groove Pizza, 118 layering, 149 Slow Jam project, 140 snare rolls, 154–​155, 155f syncing guide tracks, 98 Trap Beats project, 170 Video Beatboxing project, 198, 200 “So Fresh, So Clean” (OutKast), 118 Soft Cell, 159 son clave, 119, 120f song sections definitions and characteristics, 87f naming, 60 Slow Jam project, 135 songwriting, 14–​15 songwriting MIDI projects, 112–​174 Beatmaking project, 127–​133 Drum Programming project, 117–​126 drums vs. not-​drums, 113, 113f elements of music, 115 functional music theory, 114 Future Bass project, 147–​157 genre deconstruction, 117 House Music project, 158–​166 intersection with other types of projects, 178f Slow Jam project, 134–​146 software instruments vs. MIDI, 112–​114 sound design, 116, 116f step time vs. real time, 113–​114 Trap Beats project, 166–​174 soul, 59, 160 sound and audio effects Movie Soundtrack project, 104–​105 Slow Jam project, 145 Soundscape project, 180–​183 Trap Beats project, 171, 172f, 173 Unreliable Product Ad project, 77–​78 Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop project, 189–​190 SoundCloud, 65f, 214, 216, 222, 228, 235–​236, 263 sound creation, 14–​15 Sound on Sound magazine, 230 Soundscape project, 178–​185 assessment strategies, 185 audio effects, 180–​183 day-​by-​day plan, 179–​184 differentiated instruction, 184–​185 drones, 179–​180 duration, 178 during work time, 185 emotional thinking, 176 finishing touches, 183–​184, 184f images, 180, 180f–​181f listening examples, 178 piano, 180–​183 preparation, 179 project design, 179 technical and creative goals, 178 troubleshooting, 184

289

Index Soundtrap, 66 “Space Oddity” (David Bowie), 95 Spears, Britney, 201 speed metal, 55 Spiderman: Into the Spider-​Verse (film), 191–​192 Spotify, 4, 54, 63f, 263 Springsteen, Bruce, 55 Springwave, 238 Squarepusher, xvii “Stalag 17” (Winston Riley), 204 “Starman” (Bowie), 85 Star Trek (TV and film series), 60–​61, 248 Star Wars (film series), 102, 196, 256 “Stayin’ Alive” (Bee Gees), 55 Steely Dan, 201 Steinberg Cubase, 45 stems, 90–​91 defined, 91 finding, 90–​91 Picking Apart a Multitrack project, 90–​95 step time, 113–​114, 129 Stereogum, 54 “Still D.R.E.” (Dr. Dre), 51 “Still Life” (Oneohtrix Point Never), 179 Sting, 201 student-​led groups, 247–​258 benefits of for lab-​based courses, 256 building creative teams, 248, 249f–​250f core values, 256–​257, 257f–​258f criticism and feedback, 251–​253 expanding to other media, 256–​258 facilitating, 253–​255 Prime Directive, 248 refining ideas, 253 teacher’s role, 247–​248 whiteboard sessions, 249–​251, 251f–​252f students. See also creativity advanced students, 21, 23, 227, 247 “Airpods under the big headphones,” 210 composing “in their own style,” 5 fear of showing projects, 219–​220 inability to keep up, 222 intimidation of managing computer labs, 221–​222 irreverence, 176 lack of ideas for projects, 220 listening habits of, 54, 210 music creation as personal development, 270 music teachers’ vs. students’ definition of music, 8–​9 preparing for independence, 235 preparing for musical lifetime, 271 projects end too quickly, 218–​219 projects take too long, 217–​218 promoting program through, 21–​22 staying relevant, 220–​221 types of to focus on, 21 weak student engagement, 217 who don’t participate or identify with music education, 3, 5–​7

studio racks, 37 Subotnick, Morton, 40 “Success Is a Form of Revenge” (Wheeler), 256, 258f “Sucker M.C.’s” (RUN-​D.M.C.), 118 Sungazer, xvi “Sun Models” (Odesza), 147 Super Mario Bros (video game), 212 suspense cues, 106, 107f Swag Empire, 236 Swedish House Mafia, 158 swing, 122, 124 four-​on-​the-​floor rhythm, 130 house music, 160 syncopation, 120, 121f, 129, 160–​161, 168, 267 synthesizers, 34, 37, 103, 112, 160, 188, 238, 240, 260   Tagg, Philip, 114, 135 “Take Me To The Mardi Gras” (Bob James), 201 talent, 6–​7, 23, 49 “Talk to Yourself” (glue70), 186, 189 Taupin, Bernie, 141 teachers adapting to new teaching formats, 229–​230 creative teachers, 3–​5 as drivers of curriculum, 19 as drivers of music technology programs, 19 independent music teachers, xxv–​xxvi music teachers’ vs. students’ definition of music, 8–​9 preparing students for independence, 235 preparing students for musical lifetime, 271 public school teachers, xxv teacher-​led ensemble model, 3–​4, 6 teaching originality, 175–​176 teaching what is popular outside of school, 265–​266 winning over, 21 techno Beat Repeat effect, 41 criticisms of, 265 loops, 127 online forums, 263 repurposing existing ideas, 177 sampling, xviii tempo, 87 Technology in Music Education (TI:ME), 230 Teenage Engineering OP-​1, 113f “Teen Pregnancy” (Blank Banshee), 186 tempo Custom Cover Song project, 97–​99 identifying, 83–​84 Movie Soundtrack project, 105–​106 organizing loops by, 66–​67, 67f Simple Remix project, 82–​89 Slow Jam project, 135 tempo-​aligning, 56, 85, 188 “Ten Percent” (Double Exposure), 83

289 

290

Index

290 

“Tere Mere Beech Mein” (Mangeshkar and Balasubrahmanyam), 201 Terje, Todd, 82 Terminator 2 (film), 186, 191–​192 texture, 87t, 115, 117, 127 Théberge, Paul, 8 Theodor, Jason, 253, 254f–​255f theremins, 34 Thibeault, Matthew, 83 Thile, Chris, 100–​101 “34 Ghosts IV” (Nine Inch Nails), 202 “This Land is Your Land” (Sharon Jones and the Dap-​Kings), 96 Thomas, Timmy, 201 Tim and Eric: Awesome Show, Great Job! (TV show), 195 Timbaland, 195 Timberlake, Justin, 195 timbre, 9, 115–​116 TI:ME (Technology in Music Education), 230 “Time After Time” (Cyndi Lauper), 134 timeline progress bars, 65f, 70 understanding before looping, 62 Time Machine, 108 Tingle, Jedediah, 246 Tingle Show, The, 246 Tiny Desk Concerts, 236 Tobias, Evan, 167–​168 tone deafness (congenital amusia), 6 Toto, 93, 186–​187 “Toxic” (Britney Spears), 201 transport icons, 62, 63f–​64f, 70 trap beats, xviii, 149, 167–​168 drum machines, 55 Roland TR-​808 drum machine, xviii tresillo rhythm, 130 tropes, 52 Trap Beats project, 166–​174 assessment strategies, 173–​174 day-​by-​day plan, 168–​173 differentiated instruction, 173 drop scene, 171, 171f drum programming, 168–​170 duplicating clips, 171 duration, 166 during work time, 173 808 bass, 170 genre deconstruction, 117 Groove Pizza, 168, 169f intro scene, 171, 171f listening examples, 167 melodic elements, 170–​171 preparation, 167 project design, 168 recording, 171, 172f sound effects, 171, 172f, 173 technical and creative goals, 166–​167 troubleshooting, 171, 173

“Tree” (Selected Ambient Works Volume II, Disc 1, Track 10) (Aphex Twin), 179 tresillo rhythm, 118, 119f, 130, 140, 149–​151, 156, 169–​170 trip-​hop, 83 tropes checklist of for a genre-​based project, 52 constraints of, 51–​52 dance music, 163 defined, 51 keeping list of required tropes for subgenres short, 55 movie soundtracks, 102–​103 trap music, 170 Tucker, Allan, 218 Turino, Thomas, 268 turn-​in process audio files vs. project files, 73 demonstrating, 74 Google Classroom, 72–​73 2814, 179 “24K Magic” (Bruno Mars), 195 Twitch, 263 “Two-​Part Invention no. 4” (J.S. Bach), 15   “Umbrella” (Rihanna), 15 Understanding and Crafting the Mix (Moylan), 92 “Understanding Comedy” (Hickman), 80, 81f “Understanding EMG” (Etmans), 244–​245, 244f Unreliable Product Ad project, 75–​80 assessment strategies, 80 day-​by-​day plan, 76–​78 dialogue recording, 76–​77 differentiated instruction, 79–​80 duration, 75 during work time, 80 editing, 77, 78f exporting, 78 listening examples, 76 needed materials, 76 preparation, 76 project design, 76 scripts, 76, 77f short version, 78 sound effects, 77–​78 technical and creative goals, 76 troubleshooting, 78–​79   Valéry, Paul, 95 vaporwave, 229 aesthetic of, 187–​188 checklist of tropes for a genre-​based project, 52 sidechain, 55 Vaporwave and Lo-​Fi Hip-​Hop project, 186–​194 assessment strategies, 194 audio effects, 189–​190 day-​by-​day plan, 187–​192 differentiated instruction, 193

291

Index drumbeats, 189 duration, 186 during work time, 193–​194 finishing touches, 192, 192f gated reverb, 191, 229 listening examples, 186 preparation, 186–​187 project design, 187 repitching, 189 sampling, 188–​189, 189f synth parts, 190, 190f technical and creative goals, 186 troubleshooting, 193 Video Beatboxing project, 194–​200 assessment strategies, 200 day-​by-​day plan, 196–​199 differentiated instruction, 200 duration, 194 during work time, 200 editing, 198–​199, 198f filming, 196–​198, 197f finishing touches, 199, 199f preparation, 195 project design, 195–​196 technical and creative goals, 194–​195 troubleshooting, 199–​200 video and audio examples, 195 Viervoll, André, 92 vinyl distortion, 191 voice shout, 163, 164f volume between clips, 71, 88 digital clipping, 71

system volume, track volume, and Master volume, 73   Waits, Tom, 9 Walker, Rob, 253 Warehouse, The, 159 War of Art, The (Pressfield), 253 Weezer, 55 Weidenbaum, Marc, 262 Wenger, Etienne, 236 West, Kanye, 204 Wheeler, Skye, 258f “Whistle Song, The” (Frankie Knuckles), 158 White Stripes, The, 96 WhoSampled.com, 59, 206 “Why Can’t We Live Together” (Timmy Thomas), 201 Windows, 28, 45, 73 Wonder, Stevie, 99 Wonderland, Alison, 147 “Workin’ On It” (Dwele), 268 “Workinonit” (J Dilla), 268   Xavier, Ramona, 187, 193   Yes, 268 “Yesterday” (The Beatles), 142 “Youth” (Daughter), 134, 212 YouTube, xv, 63f, 65f, 148, 196, 208, 210–​211, 214, 230, 236, 263   zone of proximal development, 9 Zoom, 254, 261–​262

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