MIDI MADNESS-III

Example 1 is a simple classic rock style riff (which classic rock riff rip-off?). Listen to it with just guitar.
Now add a bit of Lords organ!!!!

Example 2 is a more Indie sounding idea with 5 different sounds triggered at different times to create an ethereal style texture.

Example 3 is a Westlife/Boyzone/Papidol/Xtalent ballad type. Sorry! As a working musician we all have to suffer these tunes occasionally. In this example I bring in more strings up an octave half way through. But...............Now we start to get a wee bit clever! Did you notice that in the last example the strings played a long held chord whilst the guitar continued to play arpeggios? I was using the hold pedal for that. This is one of the most useful functions that you can use as a synth player. If you play a chord with a string sample, for example, then depress the hold pedal then the chord with sustain under any other notes you play over the top without any new notes being triggered. The technical name for this is Sostenuto. You can do the same thing , but set the pedal to sustain a chord then as you play other notes they will be sustained too. This is referred to a dampening. You would use this more for a piano sound.

There are many variations of these 2 techniques like just sustaining the bottom 2 strings or replacing a note on each string as it is played. It all depends on what controller you use and how you set it up. Indeed most of your controller pedals can be set up to perform any function, just as in a guitar multi fx board you can assign your Foot volume pedal to switch fx on and off, as a wah wah, to change tremolo speeds etc. One thing it won't do (not without lots of very clever computer gadgets and days of programming) is sound like, for example, a genuine brass section unless you employ a few musical tricks and a tiny wee bit of programming for the more advanced! A normal, major tonality, pub band guitar chord is strummed from the 6th string to maybe the 2nd or 1st. This will sound ok with a brass sound. To employ a more anal approach, we 1st need to rethink the chords structure. A brass section would play a basic harmony of Rt, 3rd, 5th or more often, Rt, 3rd, Rt (+oct). our guitar chords go from the 6th string up, Rt, 5th, Rt, 3rd, 5th, Rt. So to make it more realistic sounding I play with pick and fingers as all the notes need to sound simultaneously, and I target the notes on the 6th, 4th, and 3rd strings. A brass section will also have a bit of chord inversions going on and some inner harmonic movement within each chord. Funny thing is, the punters never notice! I will cover this in much more detail in a later column. This concept of guitar playing can make even the constant hammering out of old cheesy favorites like Must hang sally, a challenge to play if you work in a bit of contrapuntal Keys and brass stabs. To give you an idea of how this works, I'll use a classic Stax/soul sounding idea with brass from my JV1080. I am also using the hold pedal. You can also stack lots of sounds together. In the last brass sound I had Trombone, Trumpet and Alto and tenor sax. The trombone is only programmed to sound below a C on the A string 15th fret so it doesn't duplicate on any other strings. basically I have a different instrument on each string to keep it real!

The last 2 ideas relate to an originals band or a tribute band. In the funky groovy type thing I use 2 different synths at the same time (both held using my sostenuto pedal) one of which uses an arpeggiator (my JV-1080 and GR-33 respectively). An arpeggiator picks notes to play and arpeggios them. It does exactly what it says on the tin! Listen to how I blend in another arpeggio voice halfway through using one of my volume controllers.

The last idea could expand the sonic palate of your murder death eat your grannie metal band with a wee bit of Dream Theatre style unison synth. I switch the synth onto a harmonizer half way through the example using another pedal for a bit of techno Maiden!