Sundog Song Studio 3.0 coming soon - sneak peak time!

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THE INTRANCER wrote:I don't get the point of this program other than to encourage people to not learn how to play the keyboard properly... seems like a really lazy way to try and compose.

Personally I learned how to play the keyboard when I was just 8 years old. (Over 30 years ago). Real music comes from within, not from what you drag and drop on a screen)
I've owned this program for about a year now and it has jump-started quite a few ideas for me, and has been one of my better musical investments. With all of the included scales it keeps me from getting stuck in rut and leads me down different paths that I may never have otherwise. I view it as an interactive chord dictionary.

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THE INTRANCER wrote:Real music comes from within, not from what you drag and drop on a screen)
It's not composing music for you... You still make the choice. It's still coming from the person using it.

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THE INTRANCER wrote:I don't get the point of this program other than to encourage people to not learn how to play the keyboard properly... seems like a really lazy way to try and compose.
Who told you, that you have to be a muscian to compose/produce/making music???

Why does everybody producing music has to learn to play an instrument ...and in our case it has to be a keyboard???
It´s quite hard to record midi notes for a piano chord with a saxophone... or perhaps the saxophone player isn´t a real musician because he cannot play keyboard???

In nowadays music scene all the "bedroom composer" or those who started like this ( means about 90% of the music you hear and like in the past 10 years) have to be at least:
-composer
-sound designer to some degree
-soundengineer
-producer
-mastering engineer to some degree
--- you name it

They have to learn all their software inside out to be able to work properly and now everybody has to be a first class musician???
Personally I learned how to play the keyboard when I was just 8 years old. (Over 30 years ago). Real music comes from within, not from what you drag and drop on a screen)
1. I think you don´t have any clue how much really great music has been composed and produced from people who have never touched any instrument in their life

2. Calling something like sundog a program for the lazy and ungifted means to me, that you personally are able to play any chord combination in nearly every scale plus hundreds of rythmic schemes for all kinds of different music styles because you learned to play a keyboard when you were eight??? And this at the same time for about 3-4 instruments simultaneously???

Respect man!!!

If not... perhaps you should perhaps overthink your point of view a bit...

For me, a program like sundog is a really great helper to try out different things on the fly
I am an idiot like deadmau5... means I am not able to play a keyboard good enough to play live everything I would like to hear, so I have to draw it in...

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Trancit wrote:
THE INTRANCER wrote:I don't get the point of this program other than to encourage people to not learn how to play the keyboard properly... seems like a really lazy way to try and compose.
Who told you, that you have to be a muscian to compose/produce/making music???

Why does everybody producing music has to learn to play an instrument ...and in our case it has to be a keyboard???
It´s quite hard to record midi notes for a piano chord with a saxophone... or perhaps the saxophone player isn´t a real musician because he cannot play keyboard???

In nowadays music scene all the "bedroom composer" or those who started like this ( means about 90% of the music you hear and like in the past 10 years) have to be at least:
-composer
-sound designer to some degree
-soundengineer
-producer
-mastering engineer to some degree
--- you name it

They have to learn all their software inside out to be able to work properly and now everybody has to be a first class musician???
Personally I learned how to play the keyboard when I was just 8 years old. (Over 30 years ago). Real music comes from within, not from what you drag and drop on a screen)
1. I think you don´t have any clue how much really great music has been composed and produced from people who have never touched any instrument in their life

2. Calling something like sundog a program for the lazy and ungifted means to me, that you personally are able to play any chord combination in nearly every scale plus hundreds of rythmic schemes for all kinds of different music styles because you learned to play a keyboard when you were eight??? And this at the same time for about 3-4 instruments simultaneously???

Respect man!!!

If not... perhaps you should perhaps overthink your point of view a bit...

For me, a program like sundog is a really great helper to try out different things on the fly
I am an idiot like deadmau5... means I am not able to play a keyboard good enough to play live everything I would like to hear, so I have to draw it in...
There is no right or wrong way to produce a piece of music but if you are removing the individuality that you as a producer is able to convey through the expression that you yourself have within, that you may otherwise be able to express through actually playing an actual instrument. Than you are without arguably cheating yourself from developing the skills required and to have a real meaningful reflection of your abilities that you, yourself will appreciate, as well as thus without cheating your listeners into thinking that you have real talent, when you don't because you're using tools that negates that...

It comes downs to being real with yourself and others in what is an artform. And there are both low levels of art and high levels of art...

Whilst I think deadmau5's music is mind numbingly repetitive and boring to the Nth degree, he doesn't hide that..but I'm pretty sure he does have the capability to play the keyboard to a modest degree.

And I don't think there is a saxophonist in this world, who can't play the keyboard as they are fundamentally the same in that they are both played vie the finger tips.
---

As for chords and scales, you can spend a lifetime discovering them and how to use them together yet you may never need to ever know what these are, and there thousands if not millions of combinations one can discover whilst actually playing a keyboard.

If you are performing in a band in particular, you will need some basic theory of chords and how they are reflected on the keyboard.

I remember when I had to play the keyboard in a band in front of 300+ people / press & TV cameras at Hollyrood palace in Edinburgh, with HRH Prince Charles watching on from somewhere in the audience back in the year 2000. Pretty exciting and scary at the same time. (And yes.. I did have a conversation with him afterwords, there was also a photograph taken with myself and the rest of the band during that point but obviously I can't make that public)

I'm self taught on the keys, and musically I produce music that I like to listen to and put great effort into producing either emotionally, technically or both... and discovering chords and combinations through actually playing is both what triggers inspiration and drive to compose music in the first place. These types of programs ride against that real self discovery one has.
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THE INTRANCER wrote: There is no right or wrong way to produce a piece of music but if you are removing the individuality that you as a producer is able to convey through the expression that you yourself have within...
That´s the only part of your response I can really deal with... no offense..

Perhaps you read your own words again and then please tell me, where is the difference between having learned before the music theory and using it or having a program knowing about the music theory and using it???

Why should be that cheating??? I mean all the program does is to give you "clickable" chords and helps you to stay in scale... but it doesn´t create anything creative for you... the creative part are still you...

Would you say it´s cheating to use piano samples instead of a real piano???

I really don´t get your problem with that...
Following your logic, every music piece, which isn´t recorded live from "real" muscians is cheating because you use software helpers to create your stuff...
Nothing else does a program like sundog...
The only cheating I see, that you could be upset having spend so many hours of learning and training, which I didn´t... but I can come up with the same complexity and musical perfectness (if we both would be equal talented in terms of creativity)...
You could play it live and experiment live with your keyboard... I would be clicking around... your fingers touch the keys... my fingers touching the mouse...
At the very end, there is not much difference...

Again... no offense mate... :tu:

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I use 3d software and I cannot draw.... Am I cheating!?! :o

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xx JPRacer xx wrote:I use 3d software and I cannot draw.... Am I cheating!?! :o
No, because... using 3D software involves a singular or multi disciplinary skill set that can take months but more likely years to truly master. What you can't naturally draw in 3D for example, you retain or substitute for a different set of skills which needs vision, knowledge, understanding of how to achieve and translate to the 3D realm. You may be able to model an object in 3D space with basic creation tools, but do you know how to edit and model it with the tools provided, do you know how to properly light it and understand the parameters to change the lighting...understand the different types lighting and the phenomenons behind it, how to texture an object... how materials are created...and that's before we even get into animation...
KVR S1-Thread | The Intrancersonic-Design Source > Program Resource | Studio One Resource | Music Gallery | 2D / 3D Sci-fi Art | GUI Projects | Animations | Photography | Film Docs | 80's Cartoons | Games | Music Hardware |

Post

THE INTRANCER wrote:
Trancit wrote:
THE INTRANCER wrote:I don't get the point of this program other than to encourage people to not learn how to play the keyboard properly... seems like a really lazy way to try and compose.
Who told you, that you have to be a muscian to compose/produce/making music???

Why does everybody producing music has to learn to play an instrument ...and in our case it has to be a keyboard???
It´s quite hard to record midi notes for a piano chord with a saxophone... or perhaps the saxophone player isn´t a real musician because he cannot play keyboard???

In nowadays music scene all the "bedroom composer" or those who started like this ( means about 90% of the music you hear and like in the past 10 years) have to be at least:
-composer
-sound designer to some degree
-soundengineer
-producer
-mastering engineer to some degree
--- you name it

They have to learn all their software inside out to be able to work properly and now everybody has to be a first class musician???
Personally I learned how to play the keyboard when I was just 8 years old. (Over 30 years ago). Real music comes from within, not from what you drag and drop on a screen)
1. I think you don´t have any clue how much really great music has been composed and produced from people who have never touched any instrument in their life

2. Calling something like sundog a program for the lazy and ungifted means to me, that you personally are able to play any chord combination in nearly every scale plus hundreds of rythmic schemes for all kinds of different music styles because you learned to play a keyboard when you were eight??? And this at the same time for about 3-4 instruments simultaneously???

Respect man!!!

If not... perhaps you should perhaps overthink your point of view a bit...

For me, a program like sundog is a really great helper to try out different things on the fly
I am an idiot like deadmau5... means I am not able to play a keyboard good enough to play live everything I would like to hear, so I have to draw it in...
There is no right or wrong way to produce a piece of music but if you are removing the individuality that you as a producer is able to convey through the expression that you yourself have within, that you may otherwise be able to express through actually playing an actual instrument. Than you are without arguably cheating yourself from developing the skills required and to have a real meaningful reflection of your abilities that you, yourself will appreciate, as well as thus without cheating your listeners into thinking that you have real talent, when you don't because you're using tools that negates that...

It comes downs to being real with yourself and others in what is an artform. And there are both low levels of art and high levels of art...

Whilst I think deadmau5's music is mind numbingly repetitive and boring to the Nth degree, he doesn't hide that..but I'm pretty sure he does have the capability to play the keyboard to a modest degree.

And I don't think there is a saxophonist in this world, who can't play the keyboard as they are fundamentally the same in that they are both played vie the finger tips.
---

As for chords and scales, you can spend a lifetime discovering them and how to use them together yet you may never need to ever know what these are, and there thousands if not millions of combinations one can discover whilst actually playing a keyboard.

If you are performing in a band in particular, you will need some basic theory of chords and how they are reflected on the keyboard.

I remember when I had to play the keyboard in a band in front of 300+ people / press & TV cameras at Hollyrood palace in Edinburgh, with HRH Prince Charles watching on from somewhere in the audience back in the year 2000. Pretty exciting and scary at the same time. (And yes.. I did have a conversation with him afterwords, there was also a photograph taken with myself and the rest of the band during that point but obviously I can't make that public)

I'm self taught on the keys, and musically I produce music that I like to listen to and put great effort into producing either emotionally, technically or both... and discovering chords and combinations through actually playing is both what triggers inspiration and drive to compose music in the first place. These types of programs ride against that real self discovery one has.

Good for you, but I'm afraid your complaints just come over as musical snobbery and are not going to change anything. You might as well go outside and shout abuse at clouds.

Many of us would love to have advanced musical skills rather than the mediocre or feeble ones we have. Some eventually will have them, but time and life have a bad habit of getting in the way, not to mention that childhood is usually the best time to learn these skills, and many of us long since missed that bus.

Granted there are nuances of expression that most will never master or fathom, but a piece of software that says "you can use these chords in this key" is essentially no different to a book that says the same thing or the bit of your mind saying "why not try that diminished chord here?".

It's fine to have your opinions, but on a website like this it's futile wasting your time trying to convince anyone else.
Last edited by jabe on Sat Apr 21, 2018 6:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.
[W10-64, T5/6/7/W8/9/10/11/12, 32(to W8)&64 all, Spike],[W7-32, T5/6/7/W8, Gina16] everything underused.

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Wow, Intrancer, you need a logic board firmware upgrade imho.

How in the world spending thousands of hours to learn a skill (playing an instrument) is superior to spending thousands of hours to learn a skill (being a composer, arranger, sound designer, mixing engineer, mastering engineer, social media guru and other thingies needed to have one’s music “out there”)?

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I was thinking about this thread when I drove to do some shopping a few hours ago.

As a composer/producer who put in a lot of work/learning into your skill can create your productions after your vision. You wake up. You get an idea. You think about the idea and already before you've laid down your first beat you know what you are aiming for, what tools to use to get there. You work like a carpenter with each step until you are ready.

Algorithmic DAWs - or whatever you want to call them - obviously works from a different perspective. You might have some idea of what you want to do - or you don't. You might not have a clue about keys, scales or when to push/pull hihats to get a nice swing. From my perspective I kind of see this as an interactive way to to enjoy music. It's more interactive than just playing a Spotify playlist. It's like those automated cars. You can drive them if you want - but some just want to go along for the ride.

/C
CLUB VICE for ARTURIA PIGMENTS
HARDWARE SAMPLER FANATIC - Akai S1100/S950/Z8 - Casio FZ20m - Emu Emax I - Ensoniq ASR10/EPS

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For chord progression or simple basslines those things may be okay but the leads.. You still have to compose the melodies on your own. There's still no (i doubt it ever will) "hit making" algorithm for leads available. Every single program claiming that spit out very boring generic and unappealing stuff.
Whoever wants music instead of noise, joy instead of pleasure, soul instead of gold, creative work instead of business, passion instead of foolery, finds no home in this trivial world of ours.

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I can play piano, I can also draw... I like using 3d Software, and I like Sundog Studio as well. ;)

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pekbro wrote:I can play piano, I can also draw...
:x

:wink:

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I can't play any instruments, I don't know any music theory. I think composing is fun, even though I almost never get anything done. I have spent, and still spending, thousands of euros on software (some of them to help me compose (like Sundog Song Studio)), because again, I think it's fun.

Question to THE INTRANCER, should I quit just because I can't play any instruments, or don't seem to be able to learn music theory properly? Should Joel Zimmerman (Deadmau5) also quit? After all, he can't play either, but on the other side, he is a quite respected composer, producer and DJ.

I don't get the point of people wearing hearing aids, using crutches or wheel chairs. They should be encouraged to hear better and be able to walk instead, or in some cases grow out a pair of new legs (still turning to THE INTRANCER).
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starflakeprj wrote:I can't play any instruments, I don't know any music theory. I think composing is fun, even though I almost never get anything done.
I know this is a bloody touchy subject, so please remember I say this only from my own experience. I'm not saying this applies to you - I'm just explaining my experience.

You have fun but you almost never get anything done? I'm glad you are having fun - that's the point :tu:

That being said - I've experienced exactly the same thing. The more "help" I get from my DAW in selecting chords, patterns, drums, swing, percussion, arrangement etc and so on - the quicker I lose interest. The song can be great but I never feel emotionally connected to it. The end user will obviously never know about those things. For me - it's been a balance of putting in effort. Even though I'm not good at all with coming up with clever chord progressions - I've come to realize that complex chord progressions (etc) doesn't matter much. Even a simple three-chord sequence with the right sound can sound gorgeous.

It's the same old discussion as using sample libraries. I love sample libraries - I buy them all the time. I have no rules how to use sample libraries - but single shots drums/sounds I have no problems with. Same goes for simple drum loops with room to add your own things - but with melody loops, ready to use bass loops - I can't touch those things. Not because I have any rules against them - but because I start to feel it's no longer my song. I know it's all in my head and listener will just experience the result. But if using pre-made loops / aid in composing make you feel the music less fun - then you are doing it wrong. Unless, it's your job and then it's a whole different matter.

/C
CLUB VICE for ARTURIA PIGMENTS
HARDWARE SAMPLER FANATIC - Akai S1100/S950/Z8 - Casio FZ20m - Emu Emax I - Ensoniq ASR10/EPS

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