From recreating a particular style to choosing which microphone to buy - I'm here to help. Fire away with your questions. [Edited by - DavW on April 15, 2005 8:33:45 PM]

When is Coldplay's next album going to be released?

not the kind of question i was aiming for, but it's the 6th June - http://www.coldplay.com/site.php

Wot is music,

Heh, sounds good.

I do a lot of digital video editing, and what I hear out of my speakers is decidedly *not* what I end up with half the times. Got any headphones suggestions?

Kenbar: From wikipedia "Music is an art, entertainment, or other human activity which involves organized sound, though definitions may vary."

Avatar God: I would normally go for anything made by Sennheiser - the HD280 Pro, HD515, HD555 (all around the £60 mark) although I've heard nothing but good reviews for the Beyerdynamic DT231 (about £35). For a tighter budget, Behringer do a range of fairly good quality headphones from £15 to £30. Alternatively, you could invest in some accurate near-field monitor speakers, although these tend to be a more expensive solution.

Damn it; I was trolling and trying to get a rise out of you. I trust that you appreciated the misspelling and the ending of the sentence on a comma?! ;)

Dav Double U, you are a gentleman.

What is you're favourite piece of music ever, and why?

That is an incredibly difficult question, as my music tastes vary from week to week, although the track that springs to mind immediately is "Trimm Trabb" from Blur's "13" album. It's a little-known gem hidden away at track 11.
Other contenders include Kraftwerk's "Computer World" album, and "Tomorrow Never Knows" by The Beatles.

A serious question: how do you write different types of music without having to listen to a lot of music from each genre? For example, say I wanted to do stuff ranging from baroque chamber music to orchestral soundtracks to death metal to 80 synth-pop to bhangra. Is there somewhere detailing the tempos, keys, structures, instrumentation, and so on for all or any of these?

Quote: Original post by Kylotan
A serious question: how do you write different types of music without having to listen to a lot of music from each genre? For example, say I wanted to do stuff ranging from baroque chamber music to orchestral soundtracks to death metal to 80 synth-pop to bhangra. Is there somewhere detailing the tempos, keys, structures, instrumentation, and so on for all or any of these?

I'll crash DavW's party on this one if I may (sorry, dude).

Short answer: you can't.

In order to capture the aesthetic values of a specific genre, you need to be not only familiar with that genre, but you need to know the structuring and the stylistic properties of that genre. For instance, you can't write a drum'n'bass track if you've only heard one mix from the genre, but you've heard a ton of 80's disco.

Sure, there are rough tempo ranges that characterize any specific genre or type of composition 60 - 80 BMP for blues (if I remember correctly), 160 - 300 for d'n'b, 24-60 for a nocturne, etc) and keys/chord structures/sequences (primarily sevenths, 11ths and 13ths for jazz, 3-chord sturtures for pop, minor chords for passions, etc), but these are nowhere close to being a standard.

You can always take the "standard" ABA buildup of a sonata and turn it into an ABB format (Moonlight sonata, Beethoven) for your personal convenience.

I guess instrumentation is one of the few more specific traits that you can use to characterise a genre or a style: the stride in jazz is always carried by the piano or the contrabass, never the trumpet or the sax; an orchestral composition requires an orchestra, period; house music requires a steady (non-variable) bass drum thump; traditional rock music requires at least one guitar, either as the accompaniment or the lead; you can't have bluegrass without a banjo; et cetera, et cetera.

In other words, you can't really capture the essence of a style without knowing it: if you've seen Ray, then that was a prime example of knowing what a genre is about and then taking its elements and twisting them into something new.

You can't say "I'm going to write a symphony now" and expect to be able to do it unless you have extensive knowledge about the orchestral sound and the properties of structuring and instrumentation. You can't get that knowledge by just reading up on it - you really do need to listen to the actual music. A lot.