Iblis

link below (dark text)
https://soundcloud.com/isabella-andries/iblis

Original art by Isabella Andries

The making of folk metal track "Iblis," named for the devil in the Quran, was a bit of a journey in and of itself in discovering what I could do with GarageBand and what I could do alone with a MIDI keyboard. Once I delved into the capabilities of the software, I discovered how easy it is to make a metal song completely electronically. Of course, my results were far different than what I could have achieved had I had live musicians, especially with the electric guitar tone, but having the power of every note and every beat at my fingertips was exhilarating. The two are entirely different processes, but it was refreshing to create the sounds I wanted without having to rely on anyone else. 

Some of the biggest things I learned about were volume control, creating drum tracks, and adjusting tempo. I found it fascinating that when you change the tempo of a project in GarageBand, everything follows. Following the beat and measure structure is incredibly important to get precise results. 

When I decided to take a more thrash metal direction with this work, I knew I had to crank up the tempo. What I found was that you could adjust the tempo easily with this line tool. I made the beginning of the piece slower so that the "Gold Oud" loops wouldn't sound rushed and unnatural. 110 beats per minute worked great for the rest of the piece, and with the separate drum track in the middle I was able to play in half time. 

The automated drum tracks ended up working wonderfully, and there was so much customization you could do. GarageBand allowed you to select from "drummers" with different musical influences, and each one came with a set of beat presets which could be adjusted in volume, complexity, which drums you were using in the pattern, which drum kit you were using, frequency of fills, and the volume of each part of the kit. 

The best example of my use of the automation tool in GarageBand was in the beginning of the piece in my utilization of the "Eastern Gold Oud" loops. since I wanted them to fade in and out, I made points on the automation curve and created the shape of the swells in volume. This technique was used throughout the piece to have a track fade in or out, or accentuate/soften recordings as needed.

I could talk for ages about how I made this piece work, but overall I would say it gave me a much greater insight into what I can achieve with simple software alone. I feel I can move forward with greater confidence in my music production endeavors, and I can't wait to see what I can do next.

Something Is Happening Exhibition

Looking at my classmates' photos individually versus altogether in the same room were entirely different experiences. One showed the relationship merely between each of our own separate photos, while the other demonstrated the similarities between all of our pictures. I noticed how Callie's "Springfield Terrorist," and Mia's "Rotting Minds," and my works all utilize bold, saturated colors, and how mine and David's "Light More Light" utilize geometric shape and stark contrast of light and dark.

In addition, the gallery room became a part of the art, as the location of a work of art is just as important as the art itself. Seeing a great pianist play in a garage is far different from Carnegie Hall, even if that pianist plays exactly the same way. No decent pianist would, considering the size of the performance space changes how the sound travels. The type of piano being played also affects the sound dramatically. Looking at a photograph unframed on a table is different from looking at it on a computer, or seeing it hung and framed in a gallery. This experience has made me contemplate how the phrase "the medium is the message" is true of all artistic expression. Every aspect of presentation becomes a part of the work itself.

John Cage

A man driven by philosophy both in his approach to composition and in his personal life, Cage worked counter to the Western traditions set by his contemporaries. His concepts of what music was and could be were entirely radical for the 1920s, when he truly became well known as a composer. The importance of chance in much of his work is most prominent; however, his methods are far from random. The execution of his works follow plans and patterns, yet the result is different each time. 

Cage also gave up the Western consumerist, capitalist ideals that dominated the artistic landscape. He famously said that one must be "disinterested," detaching oneself from the values of fame or fortune and focusing solely on art for art's sake. His interest in I Ching and Zen Buddhism demonstrate a desire to explore beyond the culture laid before him. In addition, his openness about his sexuality and lifelong relationship with Merce Cunningham that began in the 1940s showcased a sense of self, and an unwillingness to conform for the sake of conformity. 

The Ear: Favors no Point of View

One would never have guessed that a melody played on a traditional eastern instrument would strike the ear as a great metal riff. But that's exactly what happened when I pulled up the Gold Oud loops on Garageband.

As I pulled the pieces of the song together, doing my best to recreate what I was hearing in my head layered above these delectable little musical phrases, I thought about how the incredible progression of technology has birthed the genre of folk metal. It combines the industrial with the acoustic, the new with the old, drawing back on the material passed through generations of musicians and ordinary people, and a new tradition that I have discovered through the passport of the internet. And here I am, a 19 year old, white, female college student from Chicago who can't play guitar to save her life pulling together sound samples to write her own metal song. Our age is an age of "living simultaneously in all cultural modes," as McLuhan describes of the writer James Joyce (120).  In today's day and age, it's possible to dive into every corner of every house you never knew existed, finding obscurity that feels like it's yours, and using it to inform your heart's song with barely a wave of your hand, or, in this case, the click of a keypad. 

Link below: (dark text, invisible) 
https://soundcloud.com/isabella-andries/gold-oud-groove-metal 

While not of middle eastern origin, Viking metal band Arkona, who uses flute, accordion, and bagpipes in their music, has been a major inspiration of mine. 

Something is Happening

I decided to take this opportunity to show how I tend to see the world through the lens of a major band nerd. 

Link below

https://www.flickr.com/photos/165164674@N07/albums/72157672167136107/with/31342141388/

As someone who listens to hours of music every single day and wants to start a band in the future, it would seem plausible that sometimes a phrase I find floating around in the world catches my eye. When I noticed that my popcorn bottle said "Ways to Pop" on the back, I thought it sounded catchy. I then made it my mission to find band titles and song names wherever I went. I perused books and billboards, scoured the labels of household items, and kept my eye open for anything that seemed appealing. 

If the music lovers of Generation X use the new media of the smartphone and internet to explore Spotify to both find new sounds and appreciate the old, then it is just as McLuhan says: the new media is "their door to all past achievement if studied as an active (and not necessarily benign) force" (100). This project would not have come to be had it not been for the hours I spend with my headphones in, exploring rateyourmusic.com for the recommendations of others who decide to spend their short little lives appreciating art. It is another kind of education, the education of the future. 

Practice Makes Perfect

As I thought about what to possibly make my video on, I considered something I do just about every single day-- practice piano. It isn't glamorous, it isn't always fun or relaxing, and it doesn't produce a sound I would consider pretty. As is discussed in McLuhan's "The Medium is the Massage," digital media allows us to be involved in each others' lives in a way that has never before been possible. On another note, the advent of the digital camera and film has allowed artists to present the world to their audience by showing them only what they want to see, which is different than seeing a play or traversing a landscape. I wanted to force the viewer to experience or listen to something they may not find fascinating as a means of understanding what goes into a practice session. This is the reality of being a classical pianist!



"The eye--it cannot choose but see; we cannot bid the ear be still; our bodies feel, where'er they be, against or with our will." -- Wordsworth

Xiaohong Zhang: "Traversing Medium & Re-Approaching Motifs in Contemporary Art"

"Electric circuitry has overthrown the regime of 'time' and 'space' and pours upon us instantly and continuously the concerns of all other men. It has reconstituted dialogue on a global scale" (McLuhan  16). This phrase demonstrates exactly the spirit of Xiaohong Zang's work. Her paper cuttings and digital work blend traditional Chinese art styles and mediums with modern day issues. These cover not only those of the working class in China, but across the globe. The interconnectedness of people around the world is evident in her work, in the mere fact that audiences are interested in art centering around the struggles of those whose lives are far different from, and far away from, theirs.

A prime example of blending of current-day issues with traditional styles would be Zhang's print "A Thousand Miles of Mountains." The print when viewed further back has the appearance of a characteristically majestic ancient Asian landscape painting. Upon closer inspection, however, one can see that this work depicts construction rigs, cranes and smoke stacks from factory buildings. This commentary on the environmental issues that plague modern China is made all the more poignant in masking it as a traditional scene, which creates a longing for the landscape of the past destroyed by human hands.

A Thousand Miles of Mountains, digital print on canvas, 2017

Another illustration of the artists' concern for issues of the present era is her series of digital prints "Last Kiss," a set of works in honor of the losses at Sandy Hook Elementary in 2012. Using herself and her family as models, she captures an everyday exchange between siblings and parents before school, the viewer painfully aware of the tragedy to come. The scenes combine paper-cutting with digital processes, with newspaper headlines pasted onto the work.

Last Kiss I, II and III, digital print and paper-cutting, 2012-2013