Music

Here you can find some of my adventures into composing music. I like instrumental and synthesized music. I have been tinkering on a keyboard since I was about 5 years old. Back then it was simple tunes like "Row your Boat" and "When the Saints Come Marching In". Two cords and no more than one octave. When computers took over my life and I discovered Jean Michel Jarre, I started writing programs to add special synth like effects to music I played on my Casio keyboard. A Commodore 16 being the only computer that I had, you can imagine the sound effects were a little tinny. I tinkered a bit more later on the Amiga with Modtracker, however never came up with anything worth even playing to someone else. The Photo on the left shows my electric organ with a PC next to it running Cakewalk. With this I spent many a night just doing play-alongs. I'd mute the lead track in a midi file and play that on the organ. I always wanted a Midi keyboard though and in 2003 I bought my first keyboard from Yamaha. The tracks below were composed using the same Cakewalk setup, but with the Midi keyboard instead of the organ. They were recorded with that PC from the keyboards audio out which is why the levels are a bit off at times. I have also been playing with Propellerheads Reason an awesome program for virtual synthesizing. I also had a crack at learning guitar even buying an electric guitar, but my fingers were too stubby and ignorant and kept muting strings so the guitar got laid to rest.

You can download any of the tunes by right clicking on the name and selecting "Save As"

2003.mp3 Obviously composed in 2003 it was one of my first tracks. A bit simple and a bit old fashioned.

 

RetroBurner.mp3 Composed shortly after 2003 above. I feel it has a retro sound to it hence the name.

 

SundayMorning.mp3 This was my first attempt at some dance style music, also done shortly after 2003.

 

Rach'sTune.mp3 A quiet tune, first started out as a midevil chant/ritual style tune, but after changing the instruments from choir voices and bongo drums to pianos and strings and adding a gentle drum track it ended being mellow and gentle.

 

TheWhistlingMarcher.mp3 This track was an accidental composition if you can have such a thing. But when I was about 15 I tried to play the Hogan's Heroes theme by ear. This is what it ended up sounding like. The march beat and background accompaniments were taken directly from the rhythm box on my fathers electric organ.