Amado Ohland

An Attack of Fiendish Faerie by Amado Ohland

eternal thirst - first stanza only by Amado Ohland

Affirmation [Aspiration to Change Course] by Amado Ohland

Just a simple build, to practice and understand the progression and its chord members.

When you're done with this one, go hear https://soundcloud.com/amadoohland/with-all-ive-learned Enjoy!

When you're done with this one, go hear https://soundcloud.com/amadoohland/even-so-at-sunset ! It's time to re-commit to my life's calling. So, I put a little too much extra into this first one. I was in the grip of a hyper-focus, and I knew that if I didn't get something finished that the effort spent would be for little good. What has circlesinging taught me about how music works? What about my academic studies of music? What about my love of the popular music I grew up listening to? Is there a way that all these different knowledges of music can inform one another and help me make an engaging, fun, meaningful musical experience for you? It's a big question. This was probably 20 hours of work from conception to mix/master/upload. Well worth it, but I should take note.

When you're done with this one, go check out https://soundcloud.com/amadoohland/leaving

it's Friday the 13th. On a previous Friday the 13th, I recorded this. I thought I'd see if I could improve the audio quality. Did I get lucky?

Zed Oop Aw, Zeh Too Paydee Kay by Amado Ohland

What better way to learn about your Augmented Sixth chords?

It started as a song to sing to people on Sunday the 28th of March (which didn't happen, but no matter), and as an experiment in using a "neutral third" scale degree (halfway between minor and major). Turns out, I didn't feel like I'd gotten the Neutral Third to work. It just sounded disturbing. I made some adjustments, and the part in question is a little more conventionally bluesy now, using the minor AND the major and sliding between them. But some relics of the experiment remain in this sound, and I hope they lend it a bit of grime, a bit of organic dirt in its bones.

It's So Very Friday by Amado Ohland

Why Change Your Quest? by Amado Ohland

I try the 57% swing (sort-of halfway between straight and 'standard' swing), based on septuplets. NO, i cannot do this yet without studio trickery. The test—the proof-of-concept—is: does this sound straight, swung, or kind-of in the middle? If I listen to this, maybe I can learn this feel.

Will It Sway the World? by Amado Ohland

Traditional Cuban. Arranged by Brian Tate.

I tried some "minimalist"/procedural things with it that make it go too long; it's static, or requires a long attention-span to appreciate the ways in which it gradually changes from "texture A" to "texture B" and back again. Modified Arch Form—see if you can trace how it goes forward, and then backward.

Just a trifle, really, but I am attached enough to it to include it as an example of my compositions. Short, under three minutes. Initially written for 4 brass, I liked it enough that I doubled its length and scored it for standard Brass Quintet. Enjoy.

"Forget your perfect offering. There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." It wasn't during the composition of this piece that those words of Leonard Cohen came to me, but just after. As I neared completion of the piece, it was a beautiful Spring day in Appalachia, and I pulled open the shades to let the light into my home. That's when this song got named. Scored for string quartet + clarinet and French horn. Scores will be available once I clean them up and put more dynamics markings on them. If you'd like to perform this piece, just contact me for parts & score. See if you can tell some of the limitations/devices I used when composing this. BIG HINT - look at the duration.

Over the years, knowing the composers' passion for music, friends and family had adopted the practice of bringing back gifts of music-related mementos from their travels. The composer now has an eclectic collection of instruments—some only decorative, some functional, all of them beautiful, and all of them charged with personal history and meaning. Souvenirs marks the first time that these instruments have been used for the creation of music. By sampling the sounds of these instruments (plus other sonic artifacts from the composer’s history), digitally manipulating the samples, and organizing them into a sound event, he sought to imbue ordinary, mundane sounds with a sense of the fantastical. The listener may notice the sounds of: djembe, ocarina, digeridoo, kazoo, rain stick, toy xylophone, tambourine, harmony singing, bamboo flute, shekere, vocal percussion, and rustic copper cowbell.

Back at it, with the same tone row. See, I also just picked up the cheap version of Melodyne. Not because I want to be a cheater-singer, but because I often have to work out musical ideas that are beyond my ear. It's a tool. I today I sang sing-songy melodies into my DAW, and used Melodyne to round me off to the closest permutation of the tone-row I'm working with. (P[e], P[2], I[e], and I[8], for those interested.) Long story short, this was the result. I know there are several ways I'm still not doing it right—rows are not typically supported by themselves, and melody and accompaniment often move through the rows at different paces. But I think I learned something. And I kind of don't hate it.

More atonal business. Or is it? 20th Century Expressionists sought ways to express through music that didn't rely on our (I believe) natural tendency to organize the experience around a tone center. One way was to make the rules: "no repeating a note until you've done all 12 of them, and you must do your intervals in the same order throughout the piece." That's all well and good, but I think we key into sonorities. Resonances. Combinations of notes that interact with one another in particular ways. So, enough. I followed the rules, but selected an order for my notes that yielded stuff I thought sounded sonorous. Turns out it almost implies chord function. This is a good start, a proof-of-concept. More would have to be done to this to turn it into "music." I think I will.

So, am I ruined? If you can't tell what I'm talking about, the answer is: no!

Somebody stop me. I'm in a hyperfocus. Nah but seriously, here's another look at what I can do with a new toy. It may not be terribly musical, but it is of interest to me as a proof-of-concept.

Sleep Deprivation [for cello and piano] by Amado Ohland

Just a little chorale. But what happens when you split the [S] out as a lead, the [B] out as a bass, and make the inner voices a comping instrument? Cute. Starting from the part-writing rules of the Common Practice Period, I added N.C.T.s to minimize the presence of the leading tone (not entirely), then to add as many 7ths as I could (not many), then include as many 4-3 suspensions as I could. Here's what you get.

Now here's thgat same "allergic to leading tones" track as four voices (mine, badly rendered). The illustration here is that the voice leading rules of the Common Practice Period may not seem relevant to today's music, but it's all in what you do with them. I didn't even break any "rules." Imagine what you can make if you selectively adapt the rules to your harmonic language.

Three notes, three instruments, three minutes. One key change permitted, and one return to the original key. At least one slow section and one fast section. Go!

it got edited. Now I need to sing more parts to fill in these obvious gaps. But now it is done...

A new composition. As in, finished yesterday (unless my professor wants me to edit it).

A new studio recording of the first song I composed for study at Radford University. Adapting Circlesinging textures to something planned-out in advance. This is quite closer to my vision for the song... the groove could be tighter in places, but the performance is overall cleaner,

Still in the working stages, but I've decided (I'm pretty sure) that the end of the song I'm working on is going to sound mostly like this (but with a real Alto and Soprano, instead of my awful warblings).

I fibbed. One more today, then I step away from the mic. This is a version of the very same thing, but with the chord progression changed so that there are no chromatic notes AT ALL—but every chord still has a 7th, or a 6th, and some have extended harmonies like 9ths or 13ths. The voicing goes back and forth between closed and open. IF this is still Jazz, then notice: it aint the chromaticism that does it (though it helps). It aint the closed voicings (though it has a particular effect). It's the 7th chords. Put 'em everywhere.

And here you go. Combine the three, because why not. It's fun, you can hear the contrasts in the sounds, and I save the coda for the last time through. Enjoy. This might even be listenable.

And here we are again. I think this is still Jazz Choir. It sounds different though, I think. I was able to use the same Bass track, and the old Mezzo track became the new Alto track. The Tenor needed just a note or two changed, so that was sung fresh; the new Mezzo and Soprano needed to be sung. Don't ask how I got the Soprano. You would not want to know how much these exploratory tracks are the result of The Magic Of Recording Technology. Thoughts? What's it sound like?

Alright, this doesn't suck. But, is it the close voicings, the 7th chords, or the chromaticism that's doing it? I don't think it's the close voicings. I tried that on something entirely diatonic and mostly free of 7th chords, and it didn't make it. Come to think of it, in the example prior to this one, there were non-diatonic notes in all the same places as this one. And that one sounded "sometimes" Jazz-Choir, often Church-Choir. So, I'm going to do an open-voicing one (because I already figured out the notes), but I think I have to write another one that uses all 7ths and 9ths, but nothing whatsoever outside of its home key. See if that flies.

Friends! I need to know. Does this sound like Jazz Choir voicings, or am I still stuck in Church Chorale mode? There's another step I want to take, but with this step I'm testing close voicings and non-chord tones. I don't think it's there yet. There's like 1 moment that it takes a turn that's not conventional for a chorale in your Gray Hymnal. We'll see what happens when I go to a 5-voice choir and add in color tones to just about every chord.

same deal. An oldie that came up in my "Facebook Memories" lately that needed a trim at the end, so I slapped some mastering on it so you could enjoy it fer reelz.

A remaster of a good old one.

I asked the Theory II class for which I'm a GTA for a poem, phrase, word, or topic for today's song. The first one I heard clearly was "cats." What is it about asking for Prompts that sometimes gets me ones that are... outside of what I think I'll be able to do? But that was the challenge, to find the place of truth that this had for me. I wasn't going to channel Queen's "Delilah," nor do I want to go too deep into Stray Cats territory. But this is what it is today. Today. Of all days. Hail to the chief, and all that.

It doesn't thrill me, it doesn't. The song. It has issues. What DOES thrill me is that I did it from my tiny office at school, that my Composition prof thinks that I should keep this up, and that I'm staying on top of it. Enjoy.

I didn't name the track until after I listened back to it. And then, I discovered that there's only one name that this song could possibly go by. Enjoy. Oh, enjoy!

The joy of getting back to what you're supposed to be doing. Might be same key and same tempo as a song I did called "Kidding Around" or "Just Kidding" or something. This is almost as playful and a little less kid-stuff. Not much.

's'funny how I never seem to notice when it's a Friday the 13th. Two challenges I'm addressing today and for the nonce. First, what kind of chromaticism and "non-vocal friendly" things can I pull off with my voice alone? Is my mental model of the music strong enough that I can do non-diatonic things? Second, once the musical material has been made, do I come to a full enough grasp of "what's it for," what the point of the song is and how I use the material in service of that point? So many false starts today that it almost constitutes cheating. On an early take, I basically got the end, brought a part in, and said "naw that doesn't work." Instead of "yes-and"-ing that decision, I pulled the plug. Fine. I learned more this way. Enjoy.

Play on words. Let's find out what, if anything, atrophied from neglect of this daily process. Let's re-discover lost things. Play onward.

My task this week: to make sure that my return to academia is a step forward, not a regression to 20 years ago. To make sure it is a step toward what I want, and not merely a step away from things I don't like.

The title—and the image—are much darker than the song. "Move chords," I'm told, "a piece of music is an event that flows, and without harmonic motion it doesn't seem to go anywhere." Okay, I see that, as far as it goes. But I went to a weird other chord this time. Because all the other ones were taken. I did, though, remember my guiding edict for the month: "do it because it's fun!"

This bit where I sing exactly what I want to—and tell the voices in my head that are telling me how to be—this is turning out to be fun.

Something about them Major7 chords seems to frequently take me to the water. Floating or sinking or dancing on the beach.

"Remember, sing what you want to! Remember, sing for fun!" How strange that that's what I have to try to remember. Not that hard though, really.