Deadlines

At the beginning of the year I was over loaded with many different ideas for songs. I would start one idea, develop it for a few days then something new would come up and I would move on from the original idea. To try and stop my elf from doing this I wanted to set deadlines. I started by researching tips on songwriting and how deadlines can help. I came across this website.

https://www.secretsofsongwriting.com/2015/05/14/why-songwriting-deadlines-work-and-why-theyre-a-crucial-part-of-getting-better/ 

After reading through the website I was happy to use deadlines as a new process. Last year I used deadlines as a new process too but for very opposite reasons. Last year I struggled with writers block and used deadlines too as motivation to set a goal and finish a song by a certain day. This year I used deadlines as more of a decline tool. I found that having a certain date to finish a song or an idea in a day allowed me to stay interested in the song/idea that I was working on at that time, this allowed me to not run away with a new idea every couple of days and stay focused at the current project on hand.  

Altered tunings 

I have always been a big fan of playing in altered tunings , whether that be just mucking around trying to come up with new ideas or learning new songs. However, I have never sat down and written a song of my own in altered tunings. I have always loved hearing acoustic players in other tunings other than standard, in particular people such as Dylan Rynch and Tommy Emmanuel and decided that I would make altered tunings a new process. I found Dylan Ryche's  "I love My life" which can be seen below. I wanted to try and get  a similar separation from the bass on the thumb to the rest of the hand holding the chords and the melody.

I found that having the low E string turned down to a C allows the guitar to fill out the space in the music but not interrupt the melody. This can be heard at 0.52. This is something I wanted to emulate with my own tracks this year, creating a larger harmonic range on the instrument without disturbing the melody.

Tapping 

I have over the last few years been experimenting with tapping. Last year was the first time I attempted to write a song with this technique and I decided to continue it as a new process this year. I looked at many different artists this year to see how they apply this technique on the acoustic guitar. I found Mikes Daws style of tapping and how he applies while playing specifically interacting. for example in " jump" a cover of the Eddie Van Halen song which can be seen below, the subtle use accenting the melody on the high notes I found very interesting and wanted to try and emulate something like it in my own work. For example, at 1.49 in the song Mike uses two fingers to play the top half of the melody, this doesn't sound detached or clunky but flows with the rest of the accompanying notes and hammer ons.

Mic set up. 

Mic set up is something I am still very new to. I wanted to try and build on my very limited knowledge this year and include it as a new process. I started off with one mic at the 12th fret and another slightly behind the sound hole. I then experimented adding more mics and adding some higher around the fret board to try and catch the percussive noises of tapping. At first I was aiming to use a more traditional mic set ups like a 3 mic set with each mic separated by the same distance, however due to the amount of mics I had to use I decided to be more adventoures and add more. This set up can be seen below.

some of the mics I used where a little unconventional such as the can mic. I used this mic as it is very good at picking up the high end and posting the treble in a mix. I also had a room mic that is out of the shot to pick up any exes.

Harmonics

Harmonics is another technique that I have admired over the years but never tried to use it in a song of my own. I decided to use it this year after listening to the likes of Emil Ernebro. I find that it not only creates a larger harmonic range but also allows you to fill the space in the same way a sustain pedal on a Piano does. After a while of trying to incorporate harmonics into my playing I noticed that it wasn't sounding as clean as I would like. I then found a video of Emil Ernebro demonstrating how he plays pinch harmonics which can be seen below. This allowed me to see how his hands where positioned so I could then re-learn the technique and focus on making it sound musical.

After some practice and slowing down the speed I was ablel to play the harmonics cleanly. However, I still found some difficulty when coming from a busy section of a song to quickly transitioning back to the harmonics. This is something I still struggle with in my playing and will look to build on this in the future until it sounds constantly clean.

weekly chanlanges