New Patch a Week Blog

For those of you who have followed my synth patch blogs in the past you won't be surprised to hear I am learning a new instrument - the legendary MS-20, in 'mini' format. If you want to read more follow the link at the top of this page.

Sheet Music - Colorblind by Counting Crows

Although it would appear that my covers project is stalling, I have in fact been busy learning the piano with a view to playing some of the MIDI parts live as opposed to step sequencing them in the QY70. One such song I have been working on is Colorblind by the Counting Crows.

I scoured the internet for the sheet music and after finding that there were no official music books I stumbled upon a few online versions, none of which sounded that great. I then turned to YouTube and found a few good tutorials but one in particular was succinct, but more importantly accurate:

Having learnt the part and recording it into the QY70, and always keen to take on a new project, I decided to see if I could generate the sheet music for this one myself. I have Logic Pro on my laptop which has score editing facilities so having imported the quantised MIDI part onto my computer I started to draft a score for this great song.

The first obstacle I came to is the fact that the score editor in Logic Pro is actually pretty basic, so pretty soon I abandoned that for MuseScore, an open source score editor for Mac, PC and Linux users. After inputting the MIDI it was not long before I had completed the sheet music (complete with lyrics and melody), and I am making this available on here for anyone who is interested:

Colorblind Sheet Music.pdf

Note that dynamics and tempo variations are not included on this version of my sheet music. I may add this at some stage in the future once I get more proficient with the software!

Finally, just a small note on copyright:

All music is owned by the respective owners. These sheets are merely a product of my own interpretation of the song. In downloading the sheet music you are agreeing that they will be used only for personal, educational, and NON-commercial purposes.

"Built in" speaker for the QY70?

I know that built in speakers are not usually the domain of pro audio gear but I do wish that my equipment had them so I could just pick up my QY70 or microKORG and start making music straight away. I guess in my own particular situation (i.e. no fixed studio space) this wish is more relevant than for a lot of other people.

Anyway, I was keen to sort out a workaround in a similar vein to my frontlight solution I posted about earlier. So armed with two coin sized pieces of velcro and a recently purchased ipod speaker (£10 from Asda) I devised my own crude "built in" speaker arrangement:

And although it does wobble a bit, it isn't going anywhere and works great! The sound quality isn't too shoddy either, good enough for sequencing purposes anyway.

"3" Track 05 - Truman Sleeps

As well as trying to learn how to use the QY70 properly I am also trying to learn the piano and have been scouring the internet for sheet music to piano pieces I like. This particular piece is by Philip Glass which I believe was commissioned specifically for use in The Truman Show, starring Jim Carrey. Fantastic tune, fantastic film.

This was done completely using the step entry method of recording, something which I have found unwieldy but I think that was mainly because I didn't really understand note / rest lengths from music notation. On that basis it is stretching it a bit to call this a cover, more a demonstration of how a sequence generated from the page can sound. The original has a nice rhythm to it which I didn't replicate on the QY70, I may play about with the Play Effects feature at a later stage but I am happy with how this sounds for now.

Here is the original from the movie soundtrack The Truman Show:

And my QY70 version:

"3" Track 04 - Opening Night

Another great track from my Uni days, I just loved the quirkiness of dEUS. Not my favourite dEUS track (Fell Off the Floor, Man gets that honour), but one of the easiest to reproduce on the QY70!

Here is the original from the album In a Bar, Under the Sea:

And my QY70 version:

"3" Track 03 - Losing My Hair

Like Grandaddy, the lo-fi exploits of Stephen Jones in the 1990s, released under the Baby Bird moniker, are almost perfectly suited to the QY70 although it is quite hard to get the QY70 to sound quite so warmly distorted. This is my favourite Baby Bird track, discovered on an NME cover tape in 1996, happy days!

Here is the original from the album Dying Happy:

And my QY70 version:

"3" Track 02 - Jed's Other Poem (Beautiful Ground)

I absolutely adore Grandaddy. Their album The Sophtware Slump defined an era for me, a classic album and this is a beautiful track, an ode penned by Jed, a tragic forgotten robot (great video too):

And my QY70 version: