In this post, we provide a breakdown of Claudia McKenzie’s ‘Rain Down Hell’ production – a song that she performs for us on acoustic guitar and voice, before recording herself using only an iPhone, adding bass and leveraging Songzap’s Arrange feature to beautifully shape the song’s narrative. Watch the ‘making of’ video and enjoy Claudia’s dynamic performances as she gets to grips with Songzap’s many production features.
In this post, we provide a breakdown of Ethan Ash’s ‘Cry Baby’ demo – a song that he performs and records on guitar and voice using only an iPhone, with the help of RT60 directors Dr Mike and Prof Rob. Watch the ‘making of’ video and enjoy Ethan’s dynamic performances, as he gets to grips with Songzap, jams with Mike, then exports all of the song’s assets to continue working with Rob and Mike in a professional studio.
Wow, 2024 has been an amazing year for Songzap and our parent company RT60, led by Prof Rob Toulson and Dr Mike Exarchos. We went on a wild and varied adventure of technology, creativity and business development – some which was reported through our social channels and some which just passed us by a bit too quickly to mention! So here’s a quick roundup of our most exciting events that happened through the year…
In the final part of the Songzap for Pianists blog series, we’ll experiment with and shape the sonics of our designed and captured creations. The song we made in Part III features a mix of recorded keyboard performances and drum patterns we prepared for the song’s different arrangement sections, which deploy drum sounds from Songzap’s sample libraries. The objective here will be to ‘mix’ all of the song’s elements into a cohesive whole that delivers the song’s narrative effectively.
In this third part of the Songzap for Pianists blog series, we’ll expand our quest toward the ‘macro’ aspect of arrangement, developing longer-form structures and pieces through the keyboard as a compositional tool. We’ll use Songzap’s Arrange functionality to tie it all together, and organise the transition and linking of sections toward a complete song narrative.
In the second part of the Songzap for Pianists blog series, we’ll focus on timing, groove and the art of layering parts, particularly from a rhythmic perspective. We’ll play to and off the click, and develop piano grooves that interact with Songzap’s Groove Designer beats. We’ll listen to the left hand as a bass part and examine its relationship to kick drum patterns; and we’ll focus in on right-hand parts as rhythmic stabs, chops or licks that feed off, support and complement the snare and hi-hat syncopation.
Alright, so Songzap seems pretty focused on singer-songwriters and tracking acoustic instruments. But what about electric instruments? Specifically, what if you’re an electric bass player? In this blog post, I’ll focus on the electric bass, show you how to best mic your amp, and harness Songzap’s AI power to create grooves and arrangements that will infinitely support your bass practice.
In this first part of the blog series on Songzap for Pianists, we’ll come to terms with the sound of the upright piano and the techniques that will help us capture its glorious sonic footprint. Why the upright piano? It sounds great, it’s cheaper (than a grand), many more pianists have one in their home, and … if you can do it on the upright, you can also extend your knowledge to capturing a baby grand, or grand piano.
Do you need to record a demo song? Virtually every songwriter will need to record a demo song at some stage in their career, and often this is the first moment where a musician is faced with the dilemma of paying a music producer to help, or to take a leap of faith and learn to make a demo song themselves…
Songzap is a songwriting and pre-production mobile phone app designed specifically with musicians in mind. In this blog series, Mike will take you through a bunch of approaches to recording, practising with, layering and mixing the upright piano using Songzap!