Lowkey decided I wanted to make a cover of Car Lights and finally had to accept that instead of fussing around with midi instruments trying to get it to sound good that I should just learn it on guitar and finally use my guitar in something I post to youtube oh no

At the End of All Things

HIII @nowandforalways and happy 3rd of January! I made something for you and you can access it through this link.

Here's a small explanation and an apology. My original idea was to write a song, which I did, but things didn't exactly got to plan. First I messed up and remembered the deadline wrong so when I finally realized it was January 3rd and NOT 30th, it was already December.

My second mistake was to think that I would know how to use studio equipment without help and be able to record the vocals and violin parts on top of a GarageBand track. I in fact don't own half the things I would need and to do that I would have to go to my school campus and fuck around and find out way too much.

My third and final mistake was to get Covid a week before Christmas, which put me out of the game for a full week.

Anyway back to the thing I actually made:D

This song is mainly for Sam. I wanted to make something that would reflect Now and For Always, but it ended up not doing that like...at all. I know you said you liked crack...too bad, this is definitely not crack. If you really want to get in the mood, you can read the page from the book, where Frodo and sam make it out of Mount Doom and wait for rescue that will probably never come.

Being the link you will find sheet music (sorry for the 28 pages), plain lyrics and a goddamn awful MuseScore MIDI track. I tried to export it to GarageBand to make it sound better, but that was the worst decision ever and waisted me so much time.

The arrangement and orchestration is not perfect and I'd like to add so many elements to it. I also realized that writing this is 4/4 was probably not the best idea and it would've been so much better to use 6/8, but at that point I was too far along and stressed out to go back and change it so I HOPE YOU LIKE TRIPLETS:)

Please for my sake don't go in too deeply because this was literally the first song I've made all by myself.

The rhythm of the melody is funky at some points because I was ripping my hair out trying to write my thoughts out so don't take it too literally.

I will try my hardest to record the parts that I can in the following weeks <3

Would you say that a midi piano is needed when composing music? I'm still pretty new to this (only got a couple of rough tracks done) and have been on the fence on whether I should get a midi piano so I thought I'd ask

There is no answer to this question unfortunately, as it really comes down to how YOU work best.

I can talk about my own workflow, and where having a MIDI piano is helpful to me; whether one will be helpful to you depends a lot on your particular workflow, comfort level with the piano, expertise, etc.

For me, I actually start composing in MuseScore first (aka by writing it out in Western notation). I find it easiest to write that way, especially when it comes to doing cool things with rhythm and counterpoint. So I'll write it in notation first and then export MIDI from there, and then use that MIDI in my DAW to flesh it out into something more. A lot of people don't do this but they compose by "playing" into the DAW directly with a MIDI keyboard; in that case the keyboard would be invaluable.

At the DAW stage, however, I do find the keyboard useful. I use it in two ways:

- if it feels like something is missing, I might set the track on loop and "play" to it with the keyboard, and then once I figure out what's missing I'll use the keyboard to record the new part. If you have a non-MIDI instrument (including your voice) you can just as well do this by layering a recording on top instead - I do this with cello often. But the MIDI keyboard can help if you want to just record a part and mess with instrumentation later, and I also use it to bang out percussion parts sometimes.

- it really, really makes a difference if I actually "perform" the MIDI especially for melodic parts. So I will sometimes use the MIDI keyboard to record myself playing a part, instead of using the perfect performance exported from MuseScore. You can get the same effect by doing lots of detail work by editing the MIDI itself: nudging notes before or after the beat, changing velocities, modifying lengths. So a keyboard isn't strictly necessary. However if you're proficient at it, it's generally faster to play it in and then tweak it than doing all of the modifying in the piano roll. Up to you though!

Now there's one thing that a proper MIDI keyboard (as in not mine which is just an electric keyboard from like 1998 that has MIDI out, but no CC's) can really help with: recording "performances" of synth parameters. Currently I do that entirely by just adding automation manually and playing it back to see how it sounds, but playing with knobs and sliders live can really help make working with synths faster in the same way playing the notes in makes humanizing a MIDI part faster.

Anyway, I know I didn't actually answer your question, but hopefully this has given you some idea of how a MIDI keyboard might help and where in a composer's workflow it might be of use. If I'm honest my teachers in grad school tried so hard to get me to use my keyboard more, and it wasn't until I ignored them and started writing in MuseScore that I ended up writing music I liked better. So it's all personal preference and if I told you definitively yes or no I feel like I'd be doing a disservice.

It's a great tool, but only if you think you'd use it. Good luck, try stuff, see what works, and keep making music! There is no "right" way to create.

In advance of the eagerly awaited new album by Birdengine “SOMNAM” on Friday here are his 5 best albums specially for Utter Sorcery:

Lawry (Birdengine)

Here are five albums.

Leonard Cohen - Songs of Leonard Cohen (1967) Both my parents were big into Leonard and one of my earliest memories is listening to this (his debut) album with my Dad and looking at Leonard Cohen’s face on the cover. What a lyricist, what a voice and such original songwriting that takes the listener from light to dark so effortlessly. A good example of how expressive and rich a nylon-strung guitar can be and definitely a major influence that inspired me to pick up the classical guitar. His songs are completely timeless and he also seemed like such a warm and personable artist. I wish I'd seen him live. RIP Leonard.

Oneohtrix Point Never - Age Of (2018) Bendy saturated Midi Baroque harpsichord? Yes. Please. Oneohtrix Point Never aka Daniel Lopatin is an experimental electronic musician and producer I've been into for a while now. He's released a lot of albums, mostly sort of Eno/Budd-esque ambient instrumentals using synthetic sounds, but each one marks a distinct shift in style. 'Age Of' is no exception and the experimentation just keeps you wondering what’s happening next. He manages to avert categorisation like a few really great artists. Such an original producer and though I love the organic warmth of some electronic artists, OPN manages to embrace that cold, free VST, cheap-sounding, sterile inner world of computer production so uniquely. A lot of unorthodox sound design, samples and some really abrasive nasty-sounding synths. I could have happily chosen any OPN album prior to this (‘Replica’, ‘R Plus Seven’, ‘Garden of Delete’) but 'Age Of' is probably my favourite.

Portishead - Third (2008) This album is the business. I never really listened to the first two Portishead albums, I was never into trip-hop, I was just too busy listening to 'Modern Life is Rubbish' but holy cow, Portishead's third album is one beast of a ‘krautrock drumming, big warm synthy horror show’ album. The lyrics on this album are nicely ambiguous and Beth Gibbons sounds suitably harrowed. Lots of restrained guitar, as well as fat, analogue synth and minimal parts played all round. It reminds me of ‘Kid A’ as an album close to perfection for me. Again another band that drastically changed their sound, I do hope they make another one. I almost chose a Beak> album, which is Geoff Barrow, the member of Portishead who really drove this album's sound. They're also brilliant.

Nathan Fake - Blizzards (2020) Nathan Fake is an electronic producer who makes beautiful, warped, synthy, nostalgic techno. He has a real knack for melancholic, uplifting melodies and his production adds fuzzy layers of grit, hiss and saturation. His drum programming is also really impressive and totally unique. I listen to EDM when I run and I could easily have chosen James Holden, Luke Abbott, Rival Consoles or John Hopkins. There’s so much focus on production with these artists with real attention to detail. Fake sounds like he records his music on chewed-up tape. Blizzards came out last year and he doesn’t really mess around with this one, it’s driven by rhythms and beats over melody and so great to run to.

Frank Black - Teenager Of The Year (1994) What can I say about Frank Black? This album (his second solo album) comes after an outstanding body of work with Pixies and is perhaps a strange choice. This album is one of those albums that no-one else I know likes, at all. It's a long album, a double album I think. It’s very inventive and all over the place with a lot of different styles from heavy punk to extremely uncool/cool nineties synth accompaniment. I think I read that he used Midi sequencing for the first time on this album. I can’t remember why, but there was a period of time when I only listened to this album, maybe it was stuck in a CD player or something I don’t remember. When you listen to an album on repeat like that, even if you don’t like it, it seems to become part of your genetic makeup. But it really does have some great tracks on it, loads of different ideas and melodies constantly a bit like Sparks. It’s similar in style to the last two Pixies albums and Joey Santiago plays on a couple of tracks here too. Good stuff.