Stefaan Himpe
Do not stand at my grave and weep
updated
#choir #satb #acapellasong #poem #score #original #sad
Basses and Altos sing at the tonic, Tenors at the third and Sopranos at the fifth. In the order Bass-Alto-Tenor-Soprano each voice starts one beat later than the previous. The text is not in canon for reasons of intelligibility, and some notes were split in some voices only (single quarter note split into two equal pitch eighths e.g.) for text placement purposes. No other "cheats" were applied.
#tomjohnson #otherharmony #choir #satb #music #song #originalmusic #poetry
The way the voices sing against each other was inspired by how church bells tend to "phase" against each other when they call for worship. I kind of liked the effect :) Rhythmically quite a challenge to perform.
#satb #sheetmusic #choir #bells
#loss #blues #unconventional #doglove #mourning
The piano only version was uploaded earlier as "Late night thoughts".
#poetry #piano #meditative #philipglass #minimal
(I just noticed I used a wrong version of the score... some natural and flat signs are missing in the bass part... sorry about that).
Any income made from donations you make there integrally are sent to the Nordoff-Robbins institute for music therapy.
The bulk of the track is made by letting multiple tiny musical motifs (sequences) with unequal lengths and rythmic values "phase" against each other, fully embracing the lucky accidents that result from doing so. These sequences are generated using supercollider, using the Panola quark. Panola is a supercollider extension I developed which allows using text-based music "notation" in supercollider. Supercollider realizes the sequences as MIDI and send them using the VSTPlugin extension to an instance of the free and open source Surge-XT soft synthesizer.
Because the time signatures resulting from the phasing are a bit exotic (and also change a lot throughout the piece), the percussion sequences are are also generated in supercollider which makes it easier to keep them in sync with the music. Here supercollider generates midi information from a kind of drum notation for which I also developed some support and sends it as midi information to the Roland INTEGRA-7.
The counter melodies are drawn manually in the DAW using piano roll notation, and realized by the free and open source Odin2 synthesizer (I made two patches) and by the Roland INTEGRA-7 (for a third instrument).
field recordings:
Audio freesound.org/people/logancircle2/sounds/504138 (Suburban Road Traffic.mp3)
Audio freesound.org/people/garrythedog/sounds/435810 (Sound of St Benedicts Street in Norwich UK of a summer Saturday night)
Audio freesound.org/people/SoundEnsemble/sounds/519125 (633 excerpt AB BIRDS: Common blackbird 4am in May .wav)
video fragments:
Video by Taryn Elliott: pexels.com/video/traffic-on-an-intersection-road-in-a-city-3121459
Video by Kelly : pexels.com/video/clouds-moving-through-and-above-the-city-2818564
Video by Ricky Esquivel: pexels.com/video/aerial-shot-of-city-1826896
Video by Kelly Lacy: pexels.com/video/time-lapse-of-busy-street-857267
Video by Pixabay: pexels.com/video/time-lapse-video-of-tall-buildings-854325
Video by George Morina: pexels.com/video/night-traffic-at-piccadilly-circus-london-5688372
Video by Max Avans: pexels.com/video/time-lapse-video-of-city-traffic-at-night-5058323
Video by Evgenij Mikhailov: pexels.com/video/zebra-crossing-in-city-at-night-9935087
Video by Evgenij Mikhailov: pexels.com/video/zebra-crossing-in-city-at-night-9935082
Video by Nino Souza: pexels.com/video/nightlife-in-the-city-2099536
Video by Get Lost Mike: pexels.com/video/time-lapse-of-a-city-traffic-5013941
Video by Amit: pexels.com/video/view-of-sunset-1654208
Video by 葉崧民: pexels.com/video/time-lapse-footage-of-vehicular-and-people-traffic-in-a-city-street-at-daytime-2697636
Video by Produtora Midtrack: pexels.com/video/man-drinking-with-sunset-background-1899146
Video by Artem Lysenko: pexels.com/video/vehicles-travelling-in-timelapse-mode-2216413
Video by Kelly : pexels.com/video/aerial-view-of-a-town-in-tennessee-2254244
To this day, it's not clear who's the problem.
#charity #synth #rolandinstruments #surgext #odin2 #sequence #cityscape #fieldrecordings
An original composition after an old (anonymous) Christmas poem, found in The Project Gutenberg EBook of Christmas in Poetry, by Various writers.
Performance by "Cantamus", an AI based singing synthesizer.
#ChristmasCarol #WinterSong #HolidayMusic #NewChristmasCarol #WinterEmbrace #HolidayCheer #ChristmasSpirit #FestiveMusic #HolidaySeason
Thumbnail based on photo by cottonbro studio: pexels.com/photo/woman-putting-a-notebook-on-her-side-table-6940381
In this experimental piece, I use a form of minimalism, repeating the same 24 note wide dissonant chord spread over the virtual piano keyboard over and over, only varying individual note volumes and timings, bringing out some patterns hiding in the mess. Many attempts to say the same thing in a different way, ending in emptiness.
Singer: Membeth (listen to the original here: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ostersequenz.ogg - the recording does not include the amen and alleluia)
Organ accompaniment composed by: Stefaan Himpe
Organ sound generated by aeolus (free and open source physical pipe organ model)
(manual III: Gemshorn 8; manual II: Rohrflöte 8; pedal: Principal 16 + Principal 8)
Inscriptiones latinae christianae ueteres (ILCV)
(ed. Ernst Diehl, Berlin 1925 and later), 4748
Garrula cum venerit nobis in mento loquella
incendis varios viscera nostra focos.
Pulcher in aspectu ludebas in aula parentum
cunctorum gaudens blandus amator eras.
(E)heu quam misera contundis ossa sepulchri,
fimbria parentum altera flamma cremas.
When we are reminded of your chatter and tittle-tattle,
you set our hearts on all kinds of fire.
You were a beautiful little boy when you played in your parent's house,
and you knew how to charm everyone with your happiness.
Alas, your poor bones now wedged into the grave
cause another kind of fire to scorch your parent's entrails.
This morning, like he has done each morning,
for the last ten years, my father picked a wild flower
on his walk, and took it to my mom.
I decided to follow him to see her today (see her today).
And as he placed the flow'r on her grave, he said,
I wish I had picked her a fresh flower, when she was alive.
She would have loved that.
She would have loved that, would have loved that.
Will you come back to me, love, from far across the sea,
Come back to my embrace.
No, for from watery depths you can't arise
Still I hope and pray
Still I pray that you will
Come back home.
We will walk hand in hand.
Will I go to you my love, go into the sea
Back into your embrace
Yes my heart can't arise out of its grave
deeper I go
deeper I sink
I'll join you home where
you will reach for my hand.
I discovered the idea of a speaking piano through art works of the Austrian composer Peter Ablinger (https://ablinger.mur.at/), who realizes the effect on a real piano with automated keys. This video uses my (attempt at...) independent recreation of this effect. As I found out, it's one of those things that is conceptually straightforward, but the devil's in the details :)
Credits:
* Text animations generated with camala (CAption MArkup LAnguage) - a hobby project I very recently started to scratch my itch :)
* The audio to midi software was written by me in python 3 with the help of the numpy library. Although I tried other techniques as well, using the short-time fourier transform appeared to give the best results.
* The video features additional images and video fragments reused with permission:
- Piano vector image: toppng.com/show_download/174296/stylised-piano-by-at-cyberscooty-a-stylised-piano-on-piano-clip-art/large
- Pine tree vector image: freesvg.org/raseone-tree-2
- Trollface vector image: freesvg.org/troll-face
- Snowflakes: youtube.com/watch?v=rjacJY1DogU
- Video by KoolShooters: pexels.com/video/santa-claus-listening-to-music-using-a-headphone-6193878
- Video by cottonbro studio: pexels.com/video/a-cat-walking-over-the-piano-keyboard-6853337
- Video by cottonbro studio: pexels.com/video/snow-queen-in-the-forest-7354840
- Video by Artem Podrez: pexels.com/video/two-women-making-a-dance-video-6003997
- Video by Francesco Morrone: pexels.com/video/kid-running-in-the-field-holding-a-guitar-4444485
- Video by RODNAE Productions: pexels.com/video/man-dancing-beside-a-christmas-tree-6518074
* Tools used:
- Audio recording with audacity (audacityteam.org) using an AT2020USB+ microphone (audio-technica.com/nl-nl/at2020usb)
- Piano sounds are generated in real time by sending midi information to Pianoteq 8 standard version (modartt.com/). No external effects or samples are used while Pianoteq is playing.
- Python 3 programming language (python3.org)
- Camala caption generator (github.com/shimpe/camala), using toml (toml.io/en), SVG (inkscape.org/develop/about-svg), inkscape (inkscape.org), vectortween(github.com/shimpe/pyvectortween) and moviepy (zulko.github.io/moviepy)
- Video editing with kdenlive (kdenlive.org/en)
- Screen, audio and webcam recording are done with obs studio (obsproject.com)
- Everything is made on a laptop running an up-to-date EndeavourOS GNU/Linux (endeavouros.com) with the pipewire/wireplumber (pipewire.org) sound system which made desktop recording with audio a breeze. In terms of user-friendliness, pipewire is the best the best thing to happen to linux audio in a long time.
(Interestingly, I couldn't find how to display the score with correct transposing for the different instruments - either the option is hidden very well, or it's not yet present in this entirely renewed version of MuseScore 4.0.)
[Note: after a few hours more searching, I did find the concert pitch button. It's hidden in the bottom of the screen - not sure who thought that'd be intuitive... but at least it's there. Too late for this video though.]
Credits:
background video by Ambient_Nature_ Atmosphere from Pexels: pexels.com/video/a-huge-water-stream-coming-out-of-mountains-5139026
thumbnail based on publicdomainpictures.net/en/view-image.php?image=181623&picture=old-church-and-cemetery
score display from MuseScore 4.0 (musescore.org)
Darkness, drifting into the void.
Steerless, and no way to avoid
the cliffs.
Can someone out there hear my cry for help?
Lead me from this abyss.
Unclear, how did I end up here.
No signs, completely paralyzed
by fear.
Can someone out there hear my cry for help?
Lead me from this abyss, into bliss.
Shall I wait for light to guide?
Shadows finally defied?
Think of me.
--
Video credits:
Thumbnail based on "Heart-shaped hands and flame candle in darkness" by Marco Verch flickr.com/photos/30478819@N08/50362421158 under CC BY 2.0 license creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0
Video by Dan Cristian Pădureț: pexels.com/video/abstract-image-of-a-black-and-white-ink-3051492
Video by Ali Mehdi: pexels.com/video/blowing-cigarette-smoke-in-the-air-5152378
Video by Cengiz İnkaya from Pexels: pexels.com/video/lights-reflection-over-the-river-water-at-night-4192175
Video by Free Videos: pexels.com/video/video-of-trees-from-below-853839
Video by ROMAN ODINTSOV: pexels.com/video/close-up-eyes-of-a-woman-6153801
Video by Athena: pexels.com/video/a-woman-walking-away-from-a-bonfire-3006848
Video by Darshak Pandya: pexels.com/video/the-sun-sets-behind-the-mountains-2731008
"Terra Tremuit" is an offertory motet for Easter Day. Text is Psalm 76(75) vs. 9-10.
Latin Lyrics: Terra tremuit et quievit dum resurgeret in judicio Deus, alleluia.
Translation: The earth trembled and calmed down when God arose in judgment, alleluia.
The score in neume notation can be found in the "Graduale Romanum" - a book (or should I say THE book?) that collects Gregorian chants. You can browse a version online here: media.musicasacra.com/pdf/graduale1961.pdf. The score for Terra Tremuit appears on page 243.
The public domain recording of the chant was reused from commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Antifona_Terra_Tremuit_mIV.ogg.
The associated info attributes the composition to William Byrd, although I have serious doubts whether this is correct since all scores I found by Byrd contain a very different setting (both melody and harmony) of this piece.
The thumbnail is based on a public domain image pxhere.com/en/photo/904969
The synth is a Roland integra-7 with drone support from an SN synth "soft pad 4" (with an additional tempo synced 8 beat long sinusoidal LFO modulating pitch +1, filter depth +33, amp depth +63, pan depth +7) and melody from a "synth brs/JupiterHorns" patch.
The nonsensical title of the piece is a tongue-in-cheek reference to social media's click-bait titles.
Video credits:
Video door Marian Croitoru: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/wagens-weg-verkeer-voertuigen-5200378
Video door Kelly: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/uitzicht-op-zonsondergang-over-landschap-2256132
Video door Mikhail Nilov: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/weg-natuur-zand-veld-7460583
Video door Kelly: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/luchtfoto-van-een-kasteel-omgeven-door-grasland-2932335
Video door Tom Fisk: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/uitzicht-op-een-prachtig-kerkhof-1955541
Video door Kelly: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/luchtfoto-van-grasland-met-een-herenhuis-2386454
Video door Jozef Papp: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/natuur-huizen-zonnig-veld-6973571
Video door Tom Fisk: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/landschap-natuur-motief-bomen-5333744
Additional samples from freesound.org:
Car noise: freesound.org/people/FunnyVoices/sounds/575666
A murder of crows: freesound.org/people/Franki-01234/sounds/214869
Thumbnail made with replicate.com/pixray/text2image
Background video credits:
goodbye kiss: Video door Joseph Eulo: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/zee-oceaan-gebouwen-new-york-5565202
city drone footage: Video door Calito Gonzalez: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/drone-opnamen-van-de-stad-en-de-weg-zonder-verkeer-3683883
tenessee tower drone footage: Video door Kelly: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/luchtfoto-van-een-stad-in-tennessee-2254244
street drone footage: Video door Kelly: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/aeerial-uitzicht-op-de-stad-met-hoge-gebouwen-2818546
night vision drone footage: Video door Mixkit -Free Video Assets: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/luchtfoto-beelden-van-het-wegenstelsel-in-een-stad-s-nachts-2675508
blinking tower footage: Video door Taryn Elliott: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/een-modern-gebouw-torenhoog-in-het-centrum-van-een-stad-3121138
Check it out! Every dollar/euro/pound donated for this album is doubled and goes both to a music related charity and to Ukraine.
Enough reason to write some music :)
Credits:
thumbnail based on commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dreaming_in_Color_%284153927163%29.jpg
girl with seagulls Video door Taryn Elliott: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/bergen-natuur-vliegen-strand-5614887
girl in sunset Video door Mikhail Nilov: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/zee-natuur-hemel-strand-6981408
man on raft Video door Mikhail Nilov: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/natuur-hemel-vakantie-mensen-6981409
angelic girl with ball Video door Ron Lach : pexels.com/nl-nl/video/wolken-bed-zitten-maan-8262769
sleeping girl Video door Ron Lach : pexels.com/nl-nl/video/wolken-bed-stretchen-comfortabel-8263476
girl in red boat Video door Mikhail Nilov: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/zee-natuur-hemel-vakantie-6981356
girl against tree: Video door cottonbro: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/natuur-vrouw-koffie-kop-6624078
boy with flower on head Video door Yaroslav Shuraev: pexels.com/nl-nl/video/iemand-pen-schrijven-droom-7698584
This piece also reuses a lot of work from other people:
video:
youtube.com/watch?v=_PTNdCafWjY by youtube user High Resolution Database
(the images are not synchronized to the sound)
thumbnail:
pixabay.com/nl/photos/star-wars-science-fiction-1930227
ambisonic recordings:
Opening closing/door: Richard Devine
Footsteps on gravel: Stephan Schutze
Rain: Richard Devine
samples:
Background noise glissando: made with the mammut sound transformation tool from another microtonal track I made
Rocks in waterwell ambisonic recording by Richard Devine
etl Cat Explodes 24-96.wav by freesound user cmusounddesign
implosion_far.WAV by freesound user Klerrp
sci-fi cannon by freesound user humanoide9000
ship explosion 1 with build up by freesound user madamdata
slinky-zwap1.aif by freesound user alienistcog
laser zap 2.wav by freesound user .Andre_Onate
Laser Gun by freesound user Dpoggioli
laser2.wav by freesound user nsstudios
laser1.wav by freesound user nsstudios
laser3.wav by freesound user nsstudios
shooting-star-4.wav by freesound user plasterbrain
laser-gun.wav by freesound user sunnyflower
laser.wav by freesound user daleonfire
laser-gun-blast.wav by freesound user jgrzinich
blaster-shot-10-1-sytrus-rsmpl-multiprcsng-single.wav by freesound user newlocknew
sci-fi-alarm by freesound user daleonfire
stereo recording:
"star wars"-like theme written by myself in 14 EDO on analog synthesizer sequential prophet rev2 with additional percussion on Roland Integra-7, with some weird rhythms generated in the supercollider programming language. Also the complete laser shooting in the background is algorithmically generated in supercollider.
Part 1 is a meditative/relaxing piano piece accompanied by rain and subtle sound effects. This part uses free to reuse ambisonic ("3d sound") recordings by Richard Devine and a coffee drip sample from freesound user pauliep83. The video consists of a collage of free to use videos from pexels.com by users Miriam Espacio, Kelly L, Vimeo, Distill, Pixabay, Louai Munajim, Dmitry Varennikov, GamOl, Wendelin Jacober, Alexei Chudin, Mouad Mabrouk, Apoorv Srivastava, Victor Steep, Antoni Shkraba, Luz Calor Som, Amit Batra, Lay-Z Owl, Lau lau, Berkalp Turper, Nicolas Becker and Aarif Patel.
Parts 2 and 3 will be posted in the coming weeks and are completely different.
Credits:
man in fire: Photo by Cris from Pexels
burning ember: Video by Artyom Saqib from Pexels
Fun fact: the key signature switches between C# major (7 sharps) and Db major (5 flats), two keys which in fact use the exact same physical notes on a piano. Despite using the exact same notes, both scales somehow feel very different (I know it sounds rather vague), like looking at the same thing from two completely different perspectives, or telling a story from two different sides.
This composition has taken me longer than average to finish as I kept changing my mind about where to take the music and how to tweak the final notes. The score could use some extra love as it specifies no dynamics yet.... Will I regret posting the recording and the score in this not very polished state? Maybe, but for now it is what it is and it is probably good enough to get an idea what the music is about.
If you've found this video while looking for my easy piano videos, this is not one of them ;)
Video credits (in order of appearance):
Crying woman alone + thumbnail picture: Video by Alex Green from Pexels
Thinking man: Video by RODNAE Productions from Pexels
Couple: Video by Gustavo Fring from Pexels
Man on bed: Video by Honye Sanges from Pexels
Crying woman alone 2: Video by Gustavo Fring from Pexels
Rainbow man: Video by cottonbro from Pexels
Sad woman against wall: Video by Luis Quintero from Pexels
Sad dog: Video by Louai Munajim from Pexels
Sad man in white shirt: Video by cottonbro from Pexels
Woman on bed: Video by Ivan Samkov from Pexels
Sad older man: Video by Kindel Media from Pexels
Woman with headphones: Video by Ivan Samkov from Pexels
Sad man in park: Video by cottonbro from Pexels
If you pay for the album or for a track of the album, all revenue goes to charity.
I wanted to use all of the equipment I have so the recording features
the monks of Synth Roland Integra-7 singing from the Prophet's Revelations Verse 2 with the help of
St. Rymon of the Big Sky, a Cheesio WK-7600 and a very snakey appearance of a Kawai NV10.
Most parts are programmed/sequenced in supercollider. The Casio and Kawai parts are played live.
All parts (except for the Kawai) were recorded simultaneously at 96KHz using a Behringer UMC1820.
The results were mixed, balanced and seasoned to taste in Ardour 6. Finally the result was
downsampled to 44.1KHz using github.com/jniemann66/ReSampler.
Allegedly no monks were harmed during the recording of this session.
Drone footage compiled from free footage on pexels.com:
castle: Video by Tima Miroshnichenko from Pexels
sea: Video by Taryn Elliott from Pexels
lake: Video by Haakon Birkeli from Pexels
waterfall: Video by Tom Fisk from Pexels
strand: Video by James Cheney from Pexels
mother_child : Video by Marian Croitoru from Pexels
training: Video by Los Muertos Crew from Pexels
manonmountain: Video by ROMAN ODINTSOV from Pexels
sunbow: Video by Peter Fowler from Pexels
mistymountain: Video by Kelly L from Pexels
balloons: Video by Taryn Elliott from Pexels
woman_on_pillar: Video by ROMAN ODINTSOV from Pexels
beachbynight: Video by Taryn Elliott from Pexels
road: Video by Kindel Media from Pexels
waterfall: Video by Kelly L from Pexels
Ken Smith reports: Essentially, this "film" is just murky stock footage of men on a fishing trawler. What transforms it into an epic tale of Man vs. The Sea is an amazing narration by somebody named Wilfred Lucas. Mr. Lucas pulls no punches; in this violent world, decent men kill every fish they meet. But that's okay, because -- as Mr. Lucas explains -- fish are evil and deserve to die.
The complete documentary in two parts (and the modern reviewer comments!) can be found on archive.org: archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Marine+Pictures%22
The thumbnail is based on a free picture from Reimund Bertrams via pixabay.com. The free "horror font" is from Dimas Prasetyo, aka Dmletter31 at dafont.com/dm-studio-dimas-prasetyo.d7283
Video consists of free to use video fragments from pexels.com.
White horses: Video by Kelly L from Pexels
Horses on grassland: Video by SebisSPORT TRAVEL from Pexels
Horses on mountain: Video by Mikhail Nilov from Pexels
Horses on grassland 2: Video by SebisSPORT TRAVEL from Pexels
"Easy Piano" consists of a series of pieces for which you don't need to be a very advanced player. Despite being called "easy" the pieces are not trivial, and will most likely take some practice. In the "Easy Piano" playlist, the pieces are ordered from easy to more difficult (but even the hardest piece in this series remains accessible for players that are yet to reach intermediate level of playing). Some pieces are only easy if you first take the time to work out a good fingering (ask your teacher to help you :) )


