“Enduro” is my entry for the Action Music Contest (July 2020).
I envision this music behind a complex and high speed motorcycle racing scene in a theatrical movie. Not to spoil things, but our action figure is triumphant in the end!
Some techniques used:
high energy drums to create drive
low drum hits for dramatic effect
typing type sounds to increase nervous energy and to give a sense of time ticking
big brass and hits for dramatic cues
weird bowed cymbal sounds and double harp glisses to create uncertainty
chromaticism in strings and woodwinds to add tension
low contrabass clarinet for low-end darkness
----EDIT----
I also wrote about 45 seconds of suspenseful underscore before this cue. The long version along with the score can be found here.
The music was written entirely in StaffPad for iOS and I wrote the entire cue without going to a keyboard (with exception of the last 3 chords). Not writing something at a piano is a departure for me so I am happy about this. I mixed final levels, added reverb/ambience and mastered in ProTools before outputting.
I look forward to your feedback and I hope you enjoy my composition!
Thanks Everett! Sure. I’m going to make a YouTube Video soon with the leading underscore part as well and will post here. I’m not sure how I’m going to make that bit work with my motorcycle race theme idea (that I came up with post writing the piece), but I’ll figure something out. lol
Thank you Cliff. I have to admit I didn’t have a cycle chase or much of anything in mind when I wrote this piece. I just knew the piece had to be action oriented, exciting and that I wanted some dissonance. It was fun to look back and envision what imagery the piece conveyed after it was written, and that’s when I thought of the motorcycle chase. Thinking back, I think it would have been harder, or at least a lot slower for me to have written had I started with a scenario or image and had to write to it. Maybe next time I’ll try that.
Waaaay cool Brandon! I definitely get the underscore feel and I hear it working perfectly for an action sequence. The bouncing around different instruments/sections really adds to the suspense. I’ll need to try and write something like this sometime, as I always want to go big.
This piece kind of reminds me of Japanese composer Toshihiko Sahashi and some of his work on the classic Mecha show, “Full Metal Panic” (He also did the classic Gundam series) so I get the picture of a big Mecha battle working well with this.
He’s a great composer–mostly classically influenced. here’s a link to the piece your’s was reminiscent of. Starts at 7:47. Great work as always Brandon. Really like it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbFX1ROVYGY
Great composition. I love the dissonance. The phrase from 0:50 is delicious!
Production-wise; this production is very clear and it has a very pure sound. I must say that I find that perfectly expressed in this piece. I think you have made the right choices for this composition.
Thank you Theu - appreciate your comments. I’ve been wanting to write something dissonant and this piece was good to try it in. The challenge I find for more atonal style of pieces is getting the form or structure to support the various phrases. Something I’ll be working on.
Fantastic action rhythm. Good mix of orchestral instruments. I don’t understand the extra intro with a terror feeling in an enduro scene. I like the idea to use rock drums in a motorbike race, but in your mix they sound a little electronic and they need more intensity and humanize them. Once you introduce rock bass and drums, electric guitar would fit adding energy.
As always, your creations are amazing.
You are right, the extra bit of underscore didn’t fit with the motorbike race action theme. I removed it for my “action entry” on Soundcloud. Still, I did like the dramatic dissonance of it all so I included in the supplementary video.
For the drums, I kept to the kick, snare and toms sounds. Maybe adding the cymbals and hh would have added intensity. All and all I was pretty impressed with being able to produce the drum sound with a (apple) pencil and iOS. But your point is taken and I could have taken up a notch by better programming or real instruments.
