CHRISTOPHER TIN'S BLOG

The Kids Are Alright!

2009-07-03T18:15:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year, Ms. Shannon Jones of Trinity Springs Middle School wrote me an email, and told me that her choir was learning Baba Yetu. This was followed by a bunch of emails from the students in the choir, asking me if I was going to come out and hear the performance! Unfortunately I couldn't make it out to Texas, but just for fun I put together a little video to say hi to the choir:

I think it went over well!

In any case, the choir sent me a DVD of the performance, which was much appreciated; most choirs don't even tell me they're performing my music--I just stumble across their performances on YouTube (even the big professional ones don't warn me in advance!). I'd honestly go to more of these performances if I could--especially the ones in Los Angeles.

At any rate, the kids of Trinity Springs did a GREAT job with the song. Hopefully someone over there will figure out how to post it to YouTube someday, but in the meantime, if any of the choir members from TSMS are reading this, BRAVO!!! :) You guys were a delight to watch, and you all sounded great--from the chorus, to the excellent soloist, to the orchestra. And great job putting it all together, Ms. Jones!

Hope you're all having a great summer vacation! :)

Need Your Help!

2009-06-28T12:38:00.000-07:00

My good college friend Jon Goldman, whom I've done three projects with, has entered his film 'Paul Sussman's Eleven-Step Guide To Self-Actualization' into the Netflix Find Your Voice Competition. He's currently a semi-finalist, and sitting in sixth place. In order to qualify for a chance at $350,000 worth of funding to complete the film, he needs to place in the top five, and he needs every possible vote he can get.

Please take a minute to click on the link below, and cast five stars for 'Paul Sussman's Eleven-Step Guide To Self-Actualization'. It's a great script, with a great writer/director and a swell composer attached (me).

Netflix Find Your Voice Competition

Also of note; this project is a bit of a reunion for me and fellow Stanford alums. The actor you see portraying Paul Sussman is my old housemate Andrew Leeds, and the music you hear playing in the trailer is by the On Ensemble, co-founded by Shoji Kameda and Kris Bergstrom, whom I played taiko with back at Stanford.

Headline: "RIAA Copyright Fine Totals $192 Million"

2009-06-25T11:45:00.001-07:00

Whoa. Regardless of your views on the issue, I don't think there's any doubt that this is a huge tactical blunder for the RIAA:

eWeek: "RIAA Copyright Fine Totals $192 Million"

It's terrible press from the RIAA, and isn't doing anything to sway public opinion on the notion of the big bad record company.

Here's where I stand on the issue. File sharing is not a bad thing. I've discovered many a band because someone sent me an MP3, at which point I subsequently went out and bought their album. However, if you get enjoyment out of music, you really ought to help support the artist who created that music. That doesn't just mean buying the album, however: you can also help by spreading the word about their music and helping promote it amongst your friends (which, ironically, may involve file sharing).

The problem is, however, that if you think that music should simply be free, with no obligation to help the artist, then the artist you like will soon be forced to stop making music because they can't pay the bills. And once that happens on a wide scale, the independent music scene will crumble, leaving us in a world devoid of anything outside of major-label mainstream pop (heavily supported by product placement). For an example of such a market, turn to China: no one makes a living doing music there without heavy corporate sponsorship.

So support indie artists!

(On that note, tonight I'll be attending a concert by Chinese American singer/performance artist Jen Shyu, a multi-talented old friend of mine from Stanford.)

Metropol Orkest: Utrecht, Holland

2009-06-22T17:18:00.000-07:00

Just stumbled across this! It's a Portuguese blog post, written about a Dutch orchestra that's playing a certain Swahili song written by a Chinese-American composer (me).

I really have no idea what it's saying, but I believe it's a performance by the Metropol Orchestra of Utrecht, Holland, and I believe they recently did a concert of video game music where Baba Yetu was the encore. This was reported to me by a friend who happened to be there, but until I stumbled across this blog post, I never knew footage of the concert existed.

I must say, it's pretty rockin'. The drum kit is a great addition. Between this rendition, and the slow gospel version done by the Angel City Chorale, I'm beginning to think that there's a lot more classical crossover/popera/fusion potential for the song that I'm not realizing.

Hui-a: Maori Fusion Music

2009-06-18T10:56:00.000-07:00

My Maori friends Hui-a (made up of Jerome Kavanagh and Ben Mullon) have released their debut EP, Got To Live. Both artists are of Maori ancestry, and I had the good fortune to work with them in December of 2007, during my recording sessions at Abbey Road. They perform a haka and whakorero on the final track of my album, a Maori song called 'Kia Hora Te Marino'.

Also guesting on the EP is the singer Kevin Mark Trail of The Streets. The album's a great blend of traditional Maori chants and instruments, accompanied by contemporary beats. Anyone who's a fan of traditional music blended with modern instrumentation ought to give it a listen.

I quite like the title track 'Got To Live' myself. I think it would make great late-night driving music for the Los Angeles highways. It's amazing how some of those Taonga Puoro sound like wolf howls.

Tonehammer Samples

2009-06-10T00:13:00.000-07:00

A colleague of mine, Troels Folmann, is a very well-respected composer in the game industry, having scored such award-winning titles as Tomb Raider Legend and Tomb Raider Underworld. Many of us first met Troels through his fantastic annual lectures at the Game Developers Conference, in which he teaches us his tricks on how to improve the quality of our sampled orchestral mockups. It's always one of the highlights of the week for me.

He's a big proponent of custom recorded samples. In fact for years, he simply brought a Zoom field recorder around with him everywhere he went and just created his own sample library, recording off-beat objects like handrails and furniture, salvaged junk, etc. Now he's making that custom library available for purchase, and it's definitely worth checking out if you're a media composer.

Tonehammer is the company he founded with sound designer Mike Peaslee. Their catalog is rich in offbeat, unusual instruments: examples include a hangdrum, whale drum, cylindrum (essentially a PVC pipe instrument), marching band, detuned piano, etc. And if that's not enough, he has a couple sample sets called 'Anti-Drum Vol. 1 and 2', in which you can find samples of water coolers, stopwatches, Converse sneaker squeaks, soda can tabs, and a leather couch (which is actually quite an impressive, usable sound!).

I bought seven of his sample libraries, and was immediately able to use them in a project I'm working on. They're definitely worth a listen.

Angel City Chorale: "One World Many Voices"

2009-06-06T22:48:00.000-07:00

The Angel City Chorale performed 'Baba Yetu' tonight in their One World Many Voices concert--a full evening of music from around the world. At the invitation of the choir, I attended the concert, held at the Wilshire United Methodist Church in Los Angeles.

Their rendition of 'Baba Yetu' was excellent! They turned it into a slow gospel number... totally unexpected, but really effective. It made me think that there's a lot of potential for releasing such an arrangement/recording of the song. (Special nod to the tenor soloist Vini Marques, who did a great job as well.)

As for the rest of the program, it was a very diverse set list, including songs from Bulgaria, Argentina, Russia, Mongolia... really, it was right up my alley. Kudos to Sue Fink, the Artistic Director of the choir, for such challenging and diverse programming!

They're doing one more performance tomorrow night, Sunday June 7th, at 7:00 PM. Los Angeles locals should consider checking them out--they're quite an impressive group. Click here for more info.

Hopefully I'll get to work with them some more, perhaps on some future choral works--perhaps even some of the songs on Calling All Dawns.

GameMusic4All Review of GSPO Pops Orchestra

2009-06-06T02:40:00.001-07:00

GameMusic4All.com did a review of the Golden State Pops Orchestra concert a few weeks, in which I conducted. Quoth the reviewer, Anthony Ruybalid:

I have never played Civ IV before (and probably never will) but composer Christopher Tin really makes some phenomenal music which can even be enjoyed completely outside of the context of the game.

Thanks to Anthony (whom I got to meet at Video Games Live yesterday) for the review!

Video Games Live: Greek Theatre, Los Angeles

2009-06-05T11:31:00.000-07:00

Another Video Games Live concert last night. The shot below is taken right before the encore. In the old days, kids waved their lighters around. In this day and age, they wave their cell phones, PSPs, Nintendo DS's, iPhones, etc.

Did the usual Meet-And-Greet afterwards as well--signing autographs (along with my fellow composers) for the gamer fans. Always great to interact with them!

Soweto Gospel Choir Recording 'Baba Yetu'

2009-06-02T22:08:00.000-07:00

The final stop on my tri-continental trip was Johannesburg, where I was scheduled to rehearse and record with the Grammy-winning Soweto Gospel Choir, darlings of the world-music scene and perennial Grammy favorites. They will be the featured artists on my re-recording of 'Baba Yetu' for my album, Calling All Dawns.

The Soweto Gospel Choir, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, performing my music... now THAT'S exciting.

Here are pictures from the rehearsals:

And here we are at the recording session:

(On a side note, I promise that I really *do* have more poses than 'left arm raised' and 'chin down in thought', but for some reason the camera seems to catch me in one of these positions more often than not.)

Richard Mitchell did the engineering. The studio was SABC Studios Johannesburg.

I'm very, very pleased with how it turned out. The choir has some amazing voices, and the new version of Baba Yetu is going to be awe inspiring.

Dubai Fountain Music - 'Baba Yetu'

2009-05-27T13:31:00.000-07:00

I was in Dubai earlier this week, visiting the Dubai Fountain. My song 'Baba Yetu' is one of the seven pieces of music used for the choreography.

It was built by WET Design, the same company that built the fountains outside the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. It's the world's largest interactive water feature, and it sits at the foot of the Burj Dubai, the world's tallest skyscraper. Every night from 6:00 PM until 11:00 PM, hundreds of illuminated jets of water dance to a handful of pre-selected songs, with some of the larger jets launching water up to 500 ft high. It's one of the most spectacular things you'll ever see.

Here it is in action, to my music. :)

They have a short list of seven songs, that they rotate through every 20 to 30 minutes. According to the staff, the two most popular songs are Baba Yetu and the Sarah Brightman/Andrea Bocelli song 'Time To Say Goodbye'. Baba Yetu is the second most played song in their rotation--right after 'Sama Dubai', a special Emirati tribute to His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum that starts and ends each day's programming.

I'm not usually one to dwell on the life I've lived or the career I've had, but this... this was something special. Standing there by the water's edge, surrounded by hundreds of people, the music blasting on the loudspeakers and feeling the spray wash over me... I couldn't help but be a little proud of myself at that moment.

Thoughts On Paris

2009-05-25T00:35:00.001-07:00

I spent last week in Paris.

If you ask me, it's a very introspective city for artists of all types. It's not just the fact that there are seemingly hundreds of museums, galleries and concert halls scattered across the city; it's the fact that people *talk* about art over lunches, dinners and coffees. (Well, at least the people I was hanging out with do.) But apart from that, it's a city that, over the centuries, was not just a mecca for artists and musicians, but also found itself at the center of many of the major turning points of artistic evolution. So suffice to say, there's a certain mystique here that you don't get in your typical American city.

The trend during much of the 20th-century was for artists and musicians to identify themselves very strongly with movements. Everyone was an 'ist' of sorts... a cubist, a surrealist, an abstract expressionist. Composers were serialists, brutalists, impressionists, minimalists. Where are the 'ists' now? Gone. Fallen out of favor with the idea of post-modernism; that we can freely mix and match styles and approaches at our whim... that we no longer have to belong to a school, that there no longer has to be a schism between academic and populist, Uptown and Downtown. But there's part of me that thinks that it certainly would have been nice to identify oneself with a movement. To, say, have a manifesto like the Futurists did, laying claim to an artistic identity. Maybe I'm romanticizing it; after all, my own music (and in fact my own cultural identity) is certainly a mix of various influences.

While we're at it, what happened to the idea of artists and musicians being aware of the social, political and aesthetic world that they live in, and responding to it through their art? Futurism was the celebration of speed; an artistic reaction to the emergence of a world where humans could suddenly travel great distances at great velocities via trains. Post-war expressionism emerged out of the horrors of the first World War, in which a newfound fear of death--by explosions tearing bodies apart, clouds of mustard gas, etc--manifested itself in the works produced. The last time I can think of an era manifesting itself in the works produced would have been the Vietnam War era, through protest songs and the like. That was 40 years ago. What happened to artists responding to the ages in which they live? Has this been killed by consumer culture?

I spent a full day at the Centre Pompidou, checking out their permanent collection, as well as shows of Calder and Kandinsky. The building itself is pretty photogenic. It gave me ample opportunity to play with my new Canon wide-angle lens (10-22mm). (I'm still new to wide-angle photography, so I'm still trying to figure out how to keep things visually interesting... heck, I'm still working on how not to underexpose all the images, as the wide angle allows so much light that it's throwing off my light meter.)

A funny thing seen inside one of the restroom stalls in the museum:

I immediately recognized this as a coy reference to Marcel Duchamp's 'Fountain'--a seminal work of art, and one of his Readymades--a series of common, everyday objects that were placed in a museum to challenge the public's perception of what art is. I.e., if you stick a toilet in a museum and call it art, is it art?

I walked upstairs, and lo and behold, there was the original.

So now the question becomes, if you stick a reference to a work of art on a toilet, is the toilet now a clever bit of post-modern referential art? And does it challenge our perceptions of what a toilet is?

No. Not really.

Originalsoundversion.com Writeup

2009-05-21T23:45:00.000-07:00

Jayson Napolitano of pop-culture blog Original Sound Version has a writeup of the Golden State Pops Orchestra concert up. Check it out!

(He also uses some of the pics that I snapped during the concert rehearsals.)

Golden State Pops Orchestra: Concert

2009-05-17T15:01:00.000-07:00

Backstage video from the concert last night!

Thanks to Steven Allen Fox, Linda Grimes and Victor Pesavento of the Golden State Pops Orchestra for the wonderful opportunity!

On Ensemble: Ume In The Middle

2009-05-14T16:44:00.000-07:00

My friends the On Ensemble have released another album, called Ume In The Middle. It's pretty fantastic work. The On Ensemble is a neo-taiko (or taiko fusion, if you will) ensemble; they blend traditional Japanese taiko drumming with electronic beats, turntables, beat-boxing, Tuvan throat singing, and other fantastic sonic tricks.

Ordinarily taiko drumming suffers when translated to audio format. It's a very visual art form; almost a blend of martial arts and percussion. The On Ensemble overcomes this problem by compensating with some really cutting-edge record production. The guy behind the production in this case is my friend Shoji Kameda, or Kametron as he's known in liner notes.

You'll also get a chance to hear the On Ensemble on my album. They lay down taiko tracks on a number of songs, and are featured prominently in my Japanese song, Mado Kara Mieru.

Really quality stuff. Give it a listen!

Golden State Pops Orchestra (Second Rehearsal)

2009-05-14T02:03:00.000-07:00

Another rehearsal with the Golden State Pops Orchestra last night. This time I got up on the platform and conducted myself!

Conducting is a great love of mine. I was never able to study it as much as I wanted to during college and conservatory, but any chance I got I snuck into conducting classes.

My greatest skills were always as a composer, but I have to say that conducting very closely rivals the joy I get from writing music. To be perfectly self-critical, though, early on I realized I had bigger gaps in raw ability as a conductor than as a composer, and so that's partly what guided me down my composition path. For one thing, I'm not particularly good at picking tempos out of mid-air. I get excited on the podium, and typically that means the music gets played a tad faster than it should be. It's something I could work on, though, should someday I start to take conducting more seriously. Where I did always excel in class, however, was my ability to convey the musicality of a piece. So I suppose if there's any sort of consolation to be had, the spirit is there... the technique is just a little raw at the moment.

Baba Yetu Covers!

2009-05-08T20:05:00.000-07:00

Ah, yes. One of the great joys of writing a song that people like: hearing covers and remixes of your work!

I already blogged about Matt Lagoy's excellent banjo cover of Baba Yetu. Here's another remix done by Geoffrey Taucer and Brad Burr of the OCRemix community. I dig the 7/8 time!

The YouTube poster ModistOne sent me his piano cover of the song. He does a great job squeezing the many contrapuntal elements in to his arrangement. He also has 873 comments on his video so far, which is mind boggling to me.

And finally... TRANCE REMIX!

Gotta say, I love that people are doing this. Kinda wish people would give me a little more credit in their videos (at least mention who WROTE the song, please!). Also wish people could tell me when they do this stuff! It's very flattering, and I'd love to meet the people who put the time and energy into it.

Golden State Pops Orchestra (First Rehearsal)

2009-05-06T01:21:00.000-07:00

I'll be conducting the Golden State Pops Orchestra in a performance of Baba Yetu on May 16th, 2009 at the Warner Grand Theatre. It's been awhile since I've been up on the podium, so I'm definitely looking forward to the experience.

The orchestra sounded great at the first rehearsal (held at El Segundo High School, in case you're wondering why there are lockers in the background). Next week we'll be adding the choir, so that will be the true test.

Maestro Steven Allen Fox is leading this first rehearsal. Just looking at the picture makes me think I really need to get a haircut.

OverClocked Remix Interview

2009-05-02T11:24:00.000-07:00

A number of months ago I did an interview for the game music remix community OverClocked Remix that's finally been published. Check it out!

Interview

Open Forum: Becoming A Composer Pt. 3

2009-04-30T11:29:00.001-07:00

Here's the follow up to Danny K's follow question:

I forgot to ask about good harmonies/counterpoint though, so it'd be great if you could talk about that as well in the next post! Listening to Baba Yetu...

As for the harmony question, again, I think you really just have to listen to what you think is good music, and take note of what chord progressions that they use. My own music tends to keep it very simple (although I can get rather complex at times if necessary, like the instrumental buildup section in Baba Yetu when I start on a C-major and end on a C#-minor). The bulk of popular music uses just a handful of chords: I, V, IV, ii, vi, bVI, bVII, etc. (if you don't know what these letters mean, don't worry... unless you're planning on becoming a composer. In which case, if you don't know what these mean, you'd better do your homework.)

I would say, though, that for many composers, harmonic progression is not dictated separately from melody. The way I think is that I come up with melodies AND the harmonies behind them simultaneously. It's not like I say 'Here's a chord progression that I want to write a melody around.' I think it almost HAS to be done simultaneously because most of the time when you choose to write a certain note in a melody, it comes with a contextual harmonic implication as well--that is, it's a high note that wants to resolve, or wants to be stable, etc. After all, a note is given the bulk of its meaning based on the harmonic context it sits in.

I will say one thing, though; you can't write a melody that stays too comfortably within the principal notes of a chord (the one, three and five) without sounding banal and forgettable. I often move to suspended 4ths, 7ths, and 9ths, and then resolve back. Since you're a fan of Baba Yetu, give the main melody a listen and you'll see what I mean. Pay attention to when I land on notes that are part of the chord, and when I don't, both in terms of which bars they're in, and which beats on the bars. And then pay attention to the way I resolve them.

As for counterpoint, if you have any specific questions, please do ask!

Honda Odyssey "Respect The Van"

2009-04-29T08:29:00.000-07:00

I love the music in this spot!

I happen to love humorous retro things.

(Music by HUM.)

Open Forum: Becoming A Composer Pt. 2

2009-04-28T13:00:00.000-07:00

Here's Danny K's second question about composing:

Also, is it true that most modern composers, despite having a background in theory, have largely abandoned the idea of harmonic progressions and such similiar 'classical' concepts? That's what my friend (who got a full ride to Oberlin) told me, and I breathed a small sigh of relief. Should I be sitting here wondering what the chord progression in my given movement should be and what cadence I should end it with, or is it normal to just have a keyboard next to me as I compose and punch out chords to see what sounds best as I work?

Yes, it's true, but not quite in the way I think you're imagining.

Modern music in the 20th-century got very avant-garde; and the idea of any harmony at all was poo-poo'd upon as being very antiquated and dated. It was partially a response to the fact that music in the 19th-century had gotten so overly romantic, that 20th-century composers wanted to break as far away from that as possible. Here's an example that I randomly picked off YouTube:

All through the 20th-century, composers were often derided if they wrote music that was too harmonic, sentimental, or generally tuneful. However, while the classical establishment strayed from tonality, the popular establishment (and that includes composers working in film and musical theatre) stayed very tonal, and very romantic. And since public taste has always been for the tuneful, classical music saw its audience shrink to the point that even die-hard classical music fans had a hard time listening to the music of the day, and would prefer just to hear the same old 18th and 19th-century works.

So all of this is to say that, yes, it's perfectly acceptable to write music these days that doesn't follow conventional chord progressions--and in fact, that doesn't use chords at all. HOWEVER, that isn't to say that you shouldn't take the craft of chord progressions seriously. I think that if you're going to make up your mind and be a harmonic, tonal composer (and that's what almost every single film or video game composer is), you should make up your mind to do it well.

But that said, using your ear to determine what chord comes next is a perfectly valid way of coming up with chord progressions. Don't worry about classical issues of voice-leading and such. Just write what sounds good and natural to you.

I'll get to your other question about 'good harmonies/counterpoint' next. If you have any other questions, just ask!

Open Forum: Becoming A Composer Pt. 1

2009-04-25T19:28:00.000-07:00

I recently got an email from a young, intrepid high schooler named Danny K., who asked me a few questions about pursuing an education and career in creating music. So rather than just respond to him via email, I asked him if he would mind if I answered his questions on my blog, just in case other people might find my answers informative or useful. I'll probably break up my response into two separate blog posts, so check back in a few days. So with that in mind, here we go:

I was wondering if you have any tips on composing, how to make memorable melodies, themes, orchestration, etc. just really awesome tips that I could utilize to make better sounding pieces...

The most important thing, I think, is to learn how to use your ears. Listen to as much music that you think is memorable, highly melodic, catchy, etc. and really pay attention to how they construct things. For example, what's the overall shape of the melody? Does it repeat? Where does it repeat? When it repeats, does anything change, or does it stay the same?

I was lucky in that I was born with a good ear. When I hear a piece of music, I can pretty much write down for you most everything that happens in that piece. And so in fact, when I hear music, what I'm actually doing is creating a mental transcription of it in my head. I think that's what helped me learn to write good melodies. Over the course of my lifetime, I've transcribed in my head thousands and thousands of melodies. And after you do that, you pretty much intuitively know what makes a good tune.

Live In Kalamazoo, Michigan...By Way Of My Living Room

2009-03-17T22:45:00.000-07:00

My friends Tommy Tallarico and Jack Wall are trying something new. During this Friday's Video Games Live concert in Kalamazoo, Michigan, they're going to try to do a live Skype broadcast with yours truly after the performance of the Civilization IV Medley. So in other words, I'll be sitting in front of my laptop in my living room watching the concert, and afterwards they'll be projecting my image in front of the audience while asking me questions. It should be a real hoot.