February 2022 SMART Goal Project

SUMMARY

Role: Producer

Instrument: Piano

Intention (SMART Goal):

By March 2nd during this session, I will compose a full song with decent arrangement and melody while using the basics of piano such as thirds from various tutorials on YouTube such as THIS and will have created a song under the synthwave genre using thirds for my monthly revision in order to improve my skills on a piano while using the song “Animadrop – Through The Storm” for song structure.

Completed Project:
https://ethannasrullah.edublogs.org/2022/03/04/daw-audio-composition-project-2/

PRE-PRODUCTION – INQUIRY

Leader(s) in the Field / Exemplary Work(s)

The main inspiring person I used for this project was “Animadrop.” I just love the arrangement and melodies that they can create with multiple tracks.

Animadrop is a musical artist who focuses on mainly the electronic music genre. Some sub-genres he focuses on are synthwave and trap. His most recent album is “A Journey Through My Mind.”

Source: https://g.co/kgs/75NY2X

Training Source(s)

Notes on GarageBand Mixing:

SMART Goal Schedule & Composition Timeline

Day 1: During this day I worked on first picking out a MIDI keyboard and opening up a new project.

Day 2: During this day I explored the song structure used in Animadrop and messed around with kicks. I was still unsure what to focus on with this composition and SMART goal improvement.

Day 3: I came up with various melodies I liked this day and came up with the current one this day using the Grand Piano as the track instrument. I recorded the first variation of my SMART goal melody this day.

Day 4: Using the melody from the day previous I worked on adding a bassline and made the main melody a pad. The bassline track consists of two tracks.

Day 5: I made a much more in-depth background this day with multiple basslines and small changes.

Day 6: This was mostly a day of fixing off-key notes and applying automation to the project to make things sound smoother.

Day 7: Mixing was the main focus of this day; as well as improving automation. This was also the final day where I recorded my final practice of the melody I worked on.

Day 8: Feedback day; got some interesting opinions and applied them to the project if possible.

PRODUCTION

SMART Goal Starting Point Evidence

Day 3: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Lrnz29xpWKKPM32SQcTEjTh8AHnWgAbj/view?usp=sharing

SMART Goal Ending Point Evidence

Day 7: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kSg0FjN0om5DK2okCFRetQ26GfCOP49m/view?usp=sharing

POST-PRODUCTION – REFLECTION

21st Century Skills

Ways of Thinking (Creativity, Innovation, Critical Thinking, Problem Solving)

During the project where I worked on improving my piano skills, I worked on improving my time management and creativity with melodies. Some problems I came across were mostly when I would overlap my fingers on the keyboard; a thing which I started overcoming with frequent practice. Another thing was finding which octave I would focus on for the melody.

Ways of Working (Communication & Collaboration)

Throughout this project I had various reviewers of my progress. If something felt off in my composition I would get feedback from my peers regarding it.

Tools for Working (Info & Media Literacy)

The tools used in this project were GarageBand as a DAW, a MIDI keyboard as my practice instrument and lastly equipment such as headphones for mixing.

Ways of Living in the World (Life & Career)

Some things that I learned from this project was time management and focus. If I had wavered from either one the project could have been delayed.

Self-Evaluation of Final Version

The final composition could have a lot more work towards it. I didn’t manage to create that heavy feel that Animadrop can recreate but I was able to have a pretty atmospheric feeling throughout my project.

What I Learned and Problems I Solved

Overall I learned how to manage complex melodies with a good bassline; something I struggled with before. I also got a lot more fluent with GarageBand as a DAW messing around with tools such as plugins or automation, both of which were untouched before in past projects.

Grammar and Spelling

writer.com

Editor

Michael – He knows what he is doing.