Lesson video

Hello and welcome to lesson three of the unit minimalist composition.

This lesson is called creating and improvising contrasting ostinati.

So without further ado, let's jump right into it.

In this lesson, you will create and develop contrasting ostinati, including through the use of retrograding.

This lesson has three key words: improvise.

If you improvise, you make something up on the spot; Pitch is how high or low the sound is; And retrograde means when you reverse the order of the notes in the melody.

This lesson is in three parts, and the first part is creating contrasting ostinati So far, we have created a minimalist composition using rhythmic ostinati and a melodic ostinato.

Remember that ostinati is the plural of ostinato and just means more than one.

And that an ostinato is a short repeated melodic pattern.

We can now develop our ideas by creating contrasting melodic ostinati.

And to do this, we're gonna look at improvising some new ideas.

As we've just looked at, to improvise is to make up something on the spot, but we need to make sure that these work with our existing melodic ostinati.

So we're gonna use notes from the D minor pentatonic scale.

When you think of improvising, do you think of random notes? 'cause that is quite common.

And if you were told to improvise, perhaps on the keyboard, you might just get two fingers and hit random notes, random orders, random rhythms, but actually improvising, although you are making up on the spot, the best improvisations still follow some rules to make sure that they sound really, really good.

So for example, in our one here, one of the rules that we will follow is that, yes, we're gonna make it up on the spot, but we're only going to use notes from the D minor pentatonic scale.

So that reduces our improvisation sounding totally random.

As a recap, our pentatonic scale in D minor are the notes D, F, G, A, and C, with a pentatonic scale being a five-note scale, penta meaning five and tonic meaning sound.

And when we see the letters Dm, where the D is capitalised, the m stands for minor.

So let's take a look at some videos to learn about how we're going to create this contrast within our ostinati.

The first video we will watch, we're going to see how to use contrasting rhythms, and then the second video will show us contrasting pitch.

I'll show you these videos now back to back.

<v Instructor>Now I'm gonna have a go</v> at creating some contrasting ostinati for my first section.

The first thing I need to do is to choose my instrument.

So I'm gonna create a new track, and I'm gonna choose a contrasting instrument that I think sounds different, but also blends well with the instrument that I already have, which is marimba.

There's lots of things you could choose from.

There's no right or wrong as such.

You just want something that fits well with what you got, but is definitely contrasting and slightly different.

The one I'm gonna choose to use for the purposes of my first ostinato is Classical Acoustic Guitar.

It sounds quite different to the marimba, but I think they go quite well together as well.

(gentle guitar music) So that's what I'm gonna choose to use.

Now when we're creating contrasting ostinati, there's a couple of ways we can help them contrast.

And the first is by using contrasting rhythms. So the rhythm of my marimba ostinato is this.

(gentle music) It's just crotchets on each beat.

So what I'm gonna try and do is I'm gonna do some improvising.

I'm gonna put the looper on, and this is just gonna keep playing over.

And I'm gonna try and create an ostinato using some of the notes of that D minor pentatonic scale that uses a different rhythm to the marimba rhythm.

So maybe notes that aren't on the beat, or maybe some faster rhythms, and I'll see what I can come up with.

Here we go.

(lively music) (lively music continues) (lively music continues) So there was lots of different patterns there that I came up with and all of them, I'm still using those notes of that scale, but trying to use different rhythms, maybe some faster rhythms, some rhythms that were off the beat.

The one I think I'll use is gonna be this one.

(lively music) I think that works quite well.

So I'm gonna record that in now.

(lively music) And you'll notice it's four beats long, it's one bar long.

And for now I'm just gonna loop it to bar 16 as well.

Now I'm gonna create another one.

Again, a contrasting instrument.

I think for this one, we'll maybe go for, let's try some Orchestral instruments.

Maybe let's do some orchestral strings I could use.

Now, so far I've used lots of short notes, but what I don't have is any sustained notes, notes that are held and last for a long time.

So I think with this one I'm gonna experiment and try and create an ostinato that uses some sustained notes, some long notes.

So let's see what we can come up with.

(lively music) (lively music continues) I think I found one which I like, so I'm gonna record it.

(software beeps) (lively music) So it only uses two notes, but the first one is quite long and sustained, which means that it creates quite a lot of contrast with the other tracks that I've already created.

Let's loop it to bar 16.

The final thing we're gonna talk about is creating contrast with pitch.

So I'm gonna create a new track, and what I mean by creating contrast with pitch is using the D minor pentatonic scale higher up the piano or lower down the piano.

So I could use it up here up.

(bright music) Up high-pitched or I could use it low.

(deep music) And either one of those is gonna create a nice bit of contrast.

So I'm gonna choose another instrument that contrasts.

Let's maybe go for one of these, maybe something like this.

And this time I think I'll maybe create a high-pitched one that will contrast with what I've already got.

So again, a bit of improvising.

(lively music) (lively music continues) I quite like that last one I came up with.

It's quite difficult, fast semiquavers using the D minor pentatonic scale, but because it's high-pitched, it really sticks out and creates a nice bit of contrast.

So let's record that in.

(software beeps) (lively music) Then I can loop it.

Now when you're doing this, make sure you quantize your tracks and also make sure that each one of your ostinati is one-bar long and then you've looped it.

And for now, we're gonna finish them at the end of bar 16 'cause that's a good length for our first section.

So give it a shot and see what you can do.

<v ->So to recap what we just saw in those videos,</v> when creating a contrasting ostinati, we're going to use notes from the D minor pentatonic scale, but we could go higher up or lower down on the keyboard.

This means that we are gonna be playing in different octaves, and an octave is a set of eight notes.

You might notice when you look at the keyboard that there are lots of different Cs and Ds and Es, and they're the same note or letter name, but they're different pitches.

If we look to the left of our keyboard, we have lower pitches, and as we go up or over to the right, those pitches become higher, and we have sets of increasingly higher octaves.

To count an octave, we're just gonna count up eight notes, including our starting notes.

So if we wanted to start in a higher octave on the note D, we'd find the D that we'd been using, and including that D, we would count up eight notes to find a higher D.

We could do that again to find an even higher pitch D.

And in reverse we could do that to the left of the keyboard, which will help us to find a lower note.

Just remember, when you're trying to count an octave, just always count the note that you are starting on, in this example, D, as note one.

We could also use a different rhythm.

We could use sustained notes.

So that's when we hold the note down.

And if we're using a piano, we could even use the sustained pedal.

And we could also use rhythms that play off the beat.

Finally, another idea that we could use to create contrasting ostinati is using different instrument sound with something that is very easily done on a digital audio workstation.

So let's do some check for understanding now.

In which of these clips has the pitch been changed? So I'm gonna play the original, and then I'll introduce A, B, and C.

So let's have a listen to the original now.

(gentle music) And let's have a look at our potential answers.

So let's have a listen to A.

(gentle music) B.

(gentle music) And C.

(soft music) Okay, so which of those clips had a difference or a change in the pitch? Well done if you said C.

Now, in which two clips has the rhythm been changed? Here's the original before listening to our options.

(gentle music) A.

(gentle music) B.

(gentle music) or C.

(gentle music) And remember for this one we're looking for two clips, and well done if you said A and B.

That brings us on to our first task in this lesson where we are going to create three or more contrasting ostinati.

Let's take a look at the success criteria before we get started.

We need to make sure that when we create our contrasting ostinati, we are using different rhythms for each ostinato.

Use the D minor pentatonic scale and the notes are just there at the bottom, D, F, G, A, C.

We're going to use a variety in pitch, so some higher pitched or some lower pitch.

Remember to find those, we can either use the octave button on our keyboards, or count 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, either to the right or to the left to get a higher or a lower pitch.

We must make sure that the ostianti finish at the end of bar 16.

We should use different instruments and remember to quantize each track as well.

So we've seen how to do this, we know how to add some contrast, we've got our success criteria, now all that's left to do is to complete this task.

You might find it useful to pause the video here so you can use this slide for reference.

And once you've finished, make sure to save your work, come back to the video and press play to move on.

Now let's have a go at assessing a new section against the success criteria.

We've gotta think about what could be improved.

Just as a recap, let's look at the success criteria again.

So when we watch this pupil example, we wanna ask ourselves, does the ostinato use a different rhythm? Do they use the D minor pentatonic scale? Is there a variety in the pitch? Do we have a mixture of low and high notes? Does the ostinati finish at the end of bar 16? Does it use different instruments and is it quantized? So with those in mind, let's have a look at the student example now and then we can come up with our own feedback.

(lively music) (lively music continues) (lively music continues) (lively music continues) So having listened to that, you might have noticed that there was definitely some feedback to give to this example.

And yours might have looked something similar to this.

There was a mix of different rhythms, and the notes used the D minor pentatonic scale.

The tracks are quantized and they sound in time, and the ostinati are looped to the end of bar six.

So the all things that went quite well.

However, they could add some different instruments 'cause they were all the same sound, they were that marimba sound, and they should also add more contrast in the pitch.

So they're all low pitches at the moment.

So for this person to improve and stretch their work, they could have added a variety of pitched instruments, pitch percussion instruments, as well as a contrast in the pitch.

So well done if you manage to identify all of those things.

Now for the second part of this lesson, we are going to look at how to use retrograde with our melody.

So another technique to develop a melody is called retrograding where we reverse the order of the notes.

So let's have a look at this example, and I'll play it for you now.

(mellow music) We have D, C, A and G, and it's a descending melody.

So the notes are getting lower in pitch, as we go on, there are four notes.

If we were to retrograde this melody, we would reverse the order of these notes.

So instead of having D, C, A, G, we would have G, A, C, D.

And that would look like this.

(mellow music) G has gone from the last note to the first note; A has gone from the third note to the second note; C from the second note to the third note; And finally, that D that we had first in the first example is now last.

So it's an exact reversal of the notes.

We've gone D, C, A, G to G, A, C, D.

So I'm gonna play them again, and I want you to listen to the difference in the sound.

Notice that the first example, the notes go down, and the second example, the notes go up.

So here is the first example.

(mellow music) And here is the second retrograded example.

(mellow music) So what is retrograding? Is it A, repeating the notes; B, reversing the notes; C, making the notes shorter; or D, making the notes longer? Yeah, well done if you said reversing.

So let's look at another slightly more complicated example of retrograding.

So in this example we have a minim starting on the note D, and then we have four quavers, F, A, G, C.

The overall shape of this melody is ascending and we can listen to how that sounds now.

(gentle music) And before I show you, let's have a think about what we would expect when we have this retrograded melody.

So first of all, we can think of what the rhythm would look like.

Would the minim be at the beginning or the end of the bar? Would the quavers be at the beginning of the bar perhaps? And then we also need to think about reversing the order of the notes.

So currently we start on a D.

So we would expect the melody that would be retrograded to end on D.

So you might have thought that it would look something like this.

So we have the C going from the end to the beginning.

We work through these quavers just by making it backwards, and just as we thought, the D that we started with ends this retrograded melody.

So let's have a listen to the retrograded version.

(gentle music) And I'll play them back to back for us now as well.

So here's the original.

(gentle music) And it becomes this when we retrograde the melody.

(gentle music) So let's watch a video now on creating an ostinato using this technique that we've looked at, retrograding.

<v Instructor>Now I'm gonna create a new ostinato</v> for my second section by using retrograding.

We already know that retrograding is when we reverse the order of notes in a melody or an ostinato.

So to start me off, I'm gonna have a quick listen to each of my ostinati that use pitch, and I'm gonna try and choose one that I think will work well if I reverse it.

Let's have a quick listen.

(calm music) (bright music) (lively music) (gentle music) (relaxed music) So those are my melodic ostinati so far, and all of them would work backwards.

However, I think I'm gonna go for this marimba one, 'cause I think this is one of the simple ones which will be quite effective when I reverse it.

So let's have a quick listen to that again.

(calm music) So I've got four notes in this, and they are D, F, G, and then C.

♪ D, F, G, C ♪ That's my pattern.

Now to retrograde it, I'm just gonna have to reverse the order of those notes.

So that is gonna become C first, then G, then F, then D.

So that's my retrograded ostinato there.

So this.

(calm music) Turns into this.

(calm music) That's my retrograded ostinato.

And I'm ready to record that in.

Now I think to do this, I'm gonna choose a new instrument so it sounds a bit different.

So I'm gonna create a new software instrument.

We'll go for something that contrasts a little bit.

Maybe for now I'll go for, let's go into Orchestral, and I'll maybe go for Harp.

That's something I've not had so far.

It might sound a little bit different.

And I'm gonna record this at bar 17.

Metronome on.

I've got the play head where I want to record.

I've selected my track.

I've practised my notes and now I'm ready to record.

(lively music) Let's have a quick listen, check it sounds okay.

(lively music) I'm just gonna quantize it.

They're crotchets, so I can do a quarter, and then I'm gonna loop this second section.

This is gonna last from bar 17 to bar 33.

So 17 to the end of 32, which is where it says 33.

Let's just see how it sounds when it repeats.

(calm music) And that's my retrograded ostinato.

<v ->So to recap the video that we just watched,</v> to create an ostinato that uses retrograding, we need to listen to our ostinati, choose which one we want to retrograde, work out the retrograde version by reversing the rhythm and the notes.

Choose a new instrument, record it in using the metronome, and then loop from bars 17 to 32.

This is gonna create our second section.

Okay, let's do an even more complicated retrograding example.

Which of the examples shows this ostinato retrograded? So let's have a look and listen to the original example.

We have a melody that ascends and then descends.

We'll start off with semiquavers, then two quavers and two crotchets, and it sounds like this.

(bright music) So we will go through our options and then select which answer we think it is.

So we have A, which starts with four quavers and two crotchets, and it sounds like this.

(bright music) We have B, two crotchets, two quavers, and four semiquavers.

Sounds like this.

(bright music) And then we have C, two crotchets, two quavers, and four semiquavers.

However, the notes are slightly different.

C sounds like this.

(bright music) So what do you think? Which of the examples showed the original ostinato retrograded? Yes, well done if you said B.

Now this is one of those questions that you can answer even without listening to them, because you can just try and reverse those notes.

So yeah, that was B, Well done if you got that right.

That brings us on to the second task of this lesson where we're going to create an ostinato for our new section and we're going to create that new section using retrograding.

As always, let's look at our success criteria before we get started.

We must make sure that we create a new track for your retrograde ostinato.

We're going to reverse the notes of an existing ostinato.

It should be one bar or four beats long, and it needs to use the notes of the D minor pentatonic scale.

As always, when we're recording into a DAW.

We want to use the metronome to ensure that we're staying in time.

And once we finish the recording, we will make sure to quantize the pattern and then loop it from bar 17 to 32.

You might want to go back and watch the video from earlier to jog your memory, but if you're ready to go, pause the video now, go and do your task, and once you're finished, make sure to save your work and head back to this video and press play to move on.

Great, so well done, I hope that you enjoyed that.

We're going to now assess your retrograded ostinato against the success criteria.

So did you create a new track for your retrograde ostinato? Did you make sure that the new ostinato reverses the notes of another ostinato? Is your ostinato one bar or four beats long? Did you make sure to use only the notes from the D minor pentatonic scale, and did you remember to quantize and loop from bar 17 to 32? The last part of this lesson is looking at creating a second section.

So we can develop our second section by creating some additional ostinati.

So far we just have one ostinato that is a retrograde of a previous one.

We're now gonna look at developing this.

And this will follow a similar process to the first section.

So we're gonna watch two videos now.

The first video will show us which steps we need to follow and then the second video will be an example.

I'll play those videos back to back for you now.

<v Instructor>Now it's time to complete</v> my second section from bar 17 to bar 32.

In order to do that, I'm gonna follow the exact same process that I followed beforehand.

So I'm gonna start off by creating some rhythmic ostinati that repeat from 17 to 32.

And I'm gonna do those in these tracks up here.

And I'll say I'll aim for between four and six rhythmic ostinati, then I'm gonna do the same with my pitched ostinato down here.

So I'm gonna create some contrasting ostinati using rhythm, using pitch, and having some contrasting instruments, but still using that D minor pentatonic scale and still making sure that I'm creating one bar ostinatos that repeat for that section there.

So I'm gonna pause this here, I'm gonna create this, and then you'll be able to see in my next video, my end product.

Now I've been through and created my new ostinati from my new section from bar 17 to the end of bar 32.

Let's have a listen through and then I'll briefly talk you through what I've done.

(lively music) (lively music continues) Let's hear what some of those sound like on their own.

So I'll start with my untuned percussion instruments.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) As you can see there, I've got lots of different kinds of sounds and very contrasting rhythms. And together, those create quite a nice thick texture of percussion instruments.

(upbeat music) Let's listen to some of my tuned ones now.

So this was my retrograde one that I'd produced before.

(gentle music) There you can see I've got a low-pitched one on the harp and a high-pitched one on this toy glockenspiel.

So there's a nice contrast there.

And this one doesn't start playing until right near the end of the bar as well.

So there's some contrast in rhythm as well as pitch.

(gentle music) That's another high-pitched one, with some quite fast rhythms, which again contrast with the harp, which has quite a slow rhythm.

(bright music) This one has a very different sound.

So far, I've got sort of percussion instruments and string instruments.

This one is a sort of a synth brass sound which contrasts a lot and I thought it worked really nicely.

And then my last one is a very low-pitched synthesiser bass.

So the contrast there is in these really low notes that we've not got so far.

(lively music) (lively music continues) So you can hear there, I've got a new section, it goes from bar 17 to 32.

My ostinati each lasts for a beat, oh sorry, for a bar.

And then they're looped for that section there.

I've made sure I've quantized them and that I've got lots of contrast in pitch, rhythm, and instruments there.

So now we're ready to move on and develop this even further in our next lesson.

<v ->What would be an issue</v> with having too many ostinati playing at the same time? Would it be A, the notes wouldn't fit with each other; B, you wouldn't be able to hear all of the parts; Or C, it would be too loud? Well done if you said B.

You wouldn't be able to hear all of the parts.

How many bars long is our second section? Is it A, eight bars; B, 16 bars; C, 32 bars; or D, one bar? Well done if you said B, 16 bars.

So both section one and section two are equal in length.

So let's have a go at completing our second section, remembering that our second section should be starting in bar 17 and ending 16 bars later by the end of bar 32.

So the success criteria, we're gonna create a new rhythmic ostinati using untuned percussion.

Then we're gonna create new melodic ostinati using the D minor pentatonic scale.

And this is gonna make sure that we're using pitched instruments.

The ostinati should contrast in rhythm and pitch, and it should also be one bar or four beats long.

As always, we will quantize the patterns and loop from 17 to 32.

Just as before, you might want to pause the video here on this screen so you can see all of the success criteria as you work through each bullet point.

Once you've finished, save your work, come back to the video and press play to move on.

Great, well done.

I hope that you enjoyed doing the second section in that task.

We're going to watch a clip now of some pupil work, and I want you to offer some feedback.

Which of the success criteria has been achieved so far? Again, we're going to look at the success criteria and determine whether we have achieved it or not.

So for this we are going to see if we've created a new untuned rhythmic ostinati, created a new ostinati that uses tuned percussion, ensure that those notes have used a D minor pentatonic scale, that the ostinati contrast in rhythm and pitch, that they are all one bar or four beats long, that the patterns are quantized, and that the patterns loop from bar 17 to 32.

So let's watch a example of this and determine if they have achieved this or not.

(mellow music) (mellow music continues) (mellow music continues) (mellow music continues) So well done if you were able to identify that in that example.

The first one, you have created a new untuned rhythmic ostinati, was not achieved, but there was untuned instruments, they used the D minor pentatonic scale, the ostinati contrasted in rhythm and pitch.

However, it wasn't four beats long, nor were the patterns quantized, but it did loop from bar 17 to 32.

So some of those were hard to spot, but well done, if you got those right, and well done again for finishing this lesson.

In summary, when we are creating melodic ideas, we can use improvising using a scale that we know as a really useful technique to try different ideas.

And although improvising is experimental, we can be most successful in improvising when we follow certain rules and limit ourselves to certain notes such as the pentatonic scale, certain rhythms, et cetera.

This means that it's not just totally random and we're not jumping from note to note, and we make sure that it fits with what we are improvising to, whether that be a backing track, some live musicians, and that might depend on whether we are playing live or creating a certain genre.

We can also create variety by changing the pitch of our ostinati, though still using the notes of the D minor pentatonic scale.

So this point is referring to using the notes of the D minor pentatonic scale in different octaves, potentially higher octaves or lower octaves.

And we talked about counting up eight to find a new octave.

Finally, retrograding is reversing the order of the notes and is another technique that we can use to develop our melodic ideas.

Now, although this is a really common practise in minimalist music, you can experiment with using this in other music.

And in fact some composers have been using this even from the classical period where composers have written a piece all the way through.

And then the second section is the same piece but in reverse order.

So this is a common and and useful technique that can really help us to develop our melodic ideas quickly.

So that brings us to the end of this lesson.

Again, I hope you had a good time, and I'll see you for the fourth and final lesson in this unit.

Have a great day.