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Update: This compilation album has now been released! Check out Next Xen now and download it for free from split-notes. Thanks to everybody who got involved!
split-notes is a digital record label for microtonal music. We have a new compilation album in the works – and we are asking for artists to submit pieces! If you’re a xenharmonic/microtonal composer (or even if you’re not), this is a great opportunity to get heard.
More information: http://split-notes.com/comp2015.php
Let’s see if this project can rouse split-notes from its recent dormancy!
It goes without saying (actually maybe it doesn’t) that if you want to make microtonal music, you need to have the right tools. For my album Rhythm and Xen I found the perfect set of tools that worked for me to get the sound that I wanted. And all while bending notes like a madman.
Stream and download Rhythm and Xen
First the machine: I produced half the tracks on a home-built desktop computer running Windows 7. The other half were produced on an Acer laptop running Windows 8. That should tell you there’s no need to get fancy and expensive, just grab a computer made within the last 5 years and start writing.
My DAW of choice is Ableton Live 9. I used to be an FL Studio user – a really common phrase for my generation – but when I picked up Ableton Live I preferred the workflow and the base functionality. There was no looking back.
As for the default synths that come with Live, throw ‘em out. They can’t be microtuned, so they’re only good for making music that everybody else makes.
For me, the key to making microtonal music in a DAW is to find some microtunable VSTs that you like the sound of. So here are the 5 VSTs I used in Rhythm and Xen:
I love the sound design potential of this synth, and the VA waveforms sound nice for a digital synth.
FM synthesis built from the ground up to get spectrally microtuned sideband partials… what’s not to like? And if you have no idea what I’m talking about, it’s just a good FM synth. :)
Virtual analog with some weird characteristics, quirky yet bold.
It’s a SoundFont player. When you’re craving some 12-bit sounds.
An affordable orchestral sound bank, nuff said. Sadly, the more I work with GPO4, the more I can recognise it from a mile off. So now that Rhythm and Xen is complete I’m gonna retire this one.
As far as VST instruments go, these 5 were all I needed. Although, I did create a couple of my own sound generators in Max/MSP to fulfil other needs. But if you’ve seen my downloadable music resources then you already know what those are.
FX wise, I just love the collection from Variety of Sound. NastyDLA is all over this record, and I used some of their bus compressors in mastering. These plugins are amazing and free!
Oli Larkin’s Endless Series v3 is a really unique effect which can generate Shepard tones, endlessly rising tones. But the killer bit is, it can do endlessly rising or descending phaser and flanger effects too. You can create a sense of urgency doing this (great risers), or else just come up with some cool sound designs.
In the liner notes for Rhythm and Xen there a track-by-track breakdown of what instruments and compositional techniques were used. Some geeks just gotta know.
Download the album: https://sevish.bandcamp.com/album/rhythm-and-xen
Rhythm and Xen: An album of atmospheric drum & bass, breakbeat and electronic music.
Download Rhythm and Xen by Sevish
I won’t spoil all the surprises here, except to say that it’s the spiritual successor to my album Golden Hour, and has some influences from Sean but not Heard too. I hope you find it deep & wide; full of layers, details and surprises.
A full-length album like Rhythm and Xen is a huge undertaking. Almost 3 years is how long it took to complete the effort, all in my spare time, while trying to develop my career. For the first time, I’m selling an album of my solo work. Grab it for £4 – it’s more than worth it.
Facebook comments from people who listened on day 1:
“new electronic beat music that’s *actually new*”
“Better than coffee. Springer than spring. You best be listenin'”
“Wild, out of this world textures and sounds. Microtonal, hybrid, dreamy goodness. Kickass sound design.”
https://sevish.bandcamp.com/album/rhythm-and-xen
– Sevish
Sometimes when I am working on a track and I get excited, I will put a demo version up online. Some of those demos were later finished and made it onto Rhythm and Xen, the album that I’ll be releasing on May 10th. Listen back to these lil things and get a glimpse of what’s coming:
5 days to go!
Update: Download Rhythm and Xen now! :)
Release date: 2015/May/10
The wait is almost over!
Announcing Rhythm and Xen, a new album of xenharmonic drum’n’bass and electronic music by Sevish. Rhythm and Xen is the spiritual successor to the album Golden Hour.
It’s called Rhythm and Xen because it’s got rhythm and it’s got xen. Xen means it uses unusual tuning systems (and I’m not talking about drop D here). Most of the melodies in this album can’t be played in standard Western tuning at all. My goal is to explore the vast possibilities of xenharmonic music while keeping the beats fat.
The album touches on drum & bass, breaks, UK bass, 8-bit and 12-bit so it’s quite a mix. It’s 2010s music with a big 1990s influence and a few dreamy throwbacks to the 1980s. I can’t wait to show you more.
7 days to go!
I’m busy working on my new album. I’ve still got a ways to go, but thought it would be nice to recap and post up these very colourful liner notes from 2012’s Sean but not Heard.
| 1 | Lavender Fields | Carlos Alpha |
| 2 | Sniping for Wallies | The harmonic series, and 1-EDO on bass |
| 3 | 20 200 2000 20000 | 17-EDO & a little from a 22 note set based on the 1.3.7.9.11.15 Eikosany |
| 4 | Kowtow | (Forgotten) phi-based scale |
| 5 | The Entity Unmasked | A tetrachordal scale based on superparticular ratios |
| 6 | Marooned at Home | 7-note Mavila |
| 7 | Detached and Distant | 14-EDO |
| 8 | Sea Poem | 9-note Mavila |
| 9 | Faded Orange Glow | 17-EDO |
| 10 | Spuffled Gnorclacks | 17-EDO |
Dr. Ozan Yarman has recorded his qanun and compiled this beautiful SoundFont for you to use in your own work.
http://ozanyarman.com/wpress/2015/01/kanunqanun-soundfont/
Qanun SoundFont (tuned exactly to 12 equal pitches), based on sampled sounds that I obtained from my 79-tone qanun during the Summer months of 2008, which I prepared using PolyPhontics + Audacity at the beginning of 2015.
Try playing Dr. Yarman’s qanun in a SoundFont player that is capable of rendering Turkish or Arabic maqam/makam scales faithfully, such as OneSF2 (Windows, free), Scordatura (Mac OS X, free), or microsynth (Mac OS X, $20) and you’re good to go!
Here’s a helpful Scala tutorial for intermediate tunesmiths. Jacky Ligon (xen-arts.net) has explained batch processing and keyboard mapping in Scala. Batch processing is great if you have 4000 Scala tuning files (.scl) and you wish to export them as, say, MIDI tuning dumps or Anamark TUN files, without saving each file manually! You’ll also get a taste for using text commands in Scala, and creating script files from those commands.
http://xen-arts.net/microtuning-virtual-instruments-part-5/
To be fair I learned a thing or two from this article myself, and I’ll be using these tricks next time I get the chance.
Suddenly, lots of new microtonal music to hear all at once. Oh joyous day!
The results from the 2014 Untwelve Composition Competition are in, and you can listen to the finalists’ and all participants’ works from their results page. You’ll hear many tracks with a potently trippy, higher-dimensional tonality. Xen to the core. Well done to all who got involved.
John Moriarty, a member of the global xenharmonic/microtonal music movement, has been making videos to explain modern tuning theory concepts. The ideas are presented in a very visual way with narration and musical examples. I would be interested to know how tuning theory newbies get on with these vids. It’s a heavy topic, both wide and deep with details. Anyway, enjoy John’s playlist!
And I’m sure there’s more to come in the future.