Another learning experience today as I had to study up on what the Cm7 was and how to use it. And then I tinkered away with it and did several runs up and down the octaves and this is what came out:
The Cm7 is four notes played together: C Eb G and Bb, it looks like this:
So that’s the entire track right there, but played over a few different octaves and in a few different “inversions”, which means that I’ve moved the notes around the piano but kept the chord the same. There are two ways to play these inversions:
- First, hold the C note in one hand and then reposition your other hand to the same notes but on a different octave. So, C G Bb and Eb.
- Second, move the whole chord up by two notes by shifting the bottom note to the top of the chord. So, start with Eb G Bb and then C. Or, G Bb C Eb. Or, the last one is: Bb C Eb G.
At least that’s my understanding of it. In essence, you keep the underlying notes the same but you can move them around the octaves to generate different feelings or imagery the higher or lower you go.
This might seem very simple and elementary musicians who’ve studied theory but this was something I’d never really done before.
And so, upon learning this idea of “inversions”, that’s how I created the different patterns up and down the length of the board. Since I was playing this on an iPad, it was a little bit difficult to get the finger placements right all the time so I did have to go in and remove a few of the slipped notes in the MIDI file.
The melody isn’t anything special so far as that it doesn’t really tell a story, as I think most melodies. Since there is no vocal line there was nothing to play along with other than the variations I could think of using the notes that make up this chord. I was thinking of putting drums or a bass line underneath but I couldn’t get the necessary brush sound I was looking for on the snare drum and when I tried to complement the chord on the bass it just wasn’t matching up so I decided to just go with the piano.
I recorded three takes only after practicing running up and down the octaves a few times. I found that anything longer than a minute thirty seemed to drag on so I tried to keep it short. I cut up the three takes and assembled the final version.
I’ve always liked piano variations and I usually judge tracks like these by the trance they should induce. I figure if my mind can drift away with what’s being played even for a moment, then the track has done its job. It’s interesting enough and just long enough to explore the different octaves but I don’t think it overdoes what it’s supposed to do: which is simply explore the Cm7 chord.
I didn’t touch anything for post production, again opting to leave everything to their default values. I have the piano’s sustain on the entire time as I like the cinematic feel it gives to the notes.
So that would be my first piano variation. I can see some of the limitations with the technology I’m using, particularly the smallness of the iPad and I think the track would have been a little bit more dynamic if I was playing on a real keyboard or piano rather than trying to shift up the octaves on an eight inch screen.