How To Write A Classic Wild West Theme

howdy everybody welcome to the wild west now today i'm going to be writing a classic wild west theme using an amazing new brass library from bsl [Music] [Applause] [Music] what can i say okay howdy partners yeah exactly we're gonna push all those cowboy buttons i'm in the shed and um we're gonna get cracking and we're gonna see what kind of western thing we can come up with in just under 30 minutes so i better get on with it um i've done some homework you'll be pleased to hear and this is the conclusion i've come to with um western themes um they're almost always uh obviously they're sort of big traditional orchestral events there's they're not hybrid they've got uh they're almost always in a major key they use an awful lot of really basic sort of one four and five chords particularly four so a lot of it goes that's magnificent seven ore um silverado bruce broughton or there's uh all that one and four one and four so lots of lots of that going on um the other thing is there is a particular chord progression which almost every western theme uses which is going from uh chord one which is if we just stick in c you'll see what i mean you then go to chord uh four or four which is you go down a tone to the b flat and then you go to chord five so you're going from chord one to chord four of four and now when i'm saying four or four chord four of c is f called four of f takes you to the b flat so you go do you recognize that sort of big landscape doesn't know don't those chords sum that up what am i just what i'm wittering on when i've really got to get on with this so um we're going to use um an entirely vsl template here so just running you quickly through all the woodwind is a special edition um the brass as i was mentioning before is um the new synchron brass library we then have harp and percussion the percussion is all special edition um there's a bit of a choir from from special edition as well and then the two string libraries the string pro which is the larger ensembles and elite which is the chamber on strongholds and down here i've got a couple of pianos uh going just so i can sort of smith stuff out and work out what we're going to play because it's in am i really going to keep this cowboy out on the whole time sounds like a yes then okay thank you for your support you're supposed to say no take it off we don't mind so i'm gonna sit here like a complete banana i mean a banana who happens to have nail varnish on because his daughters thought it would be really funny to put it on yesterday and so now i've got nail varnish a rather elegant shade of pink what can i tell you okay so look bpm what are we looking at i'm going to go up a bit on that that's 120 beats a minute but i think we can uh let's go i tell you the struggle i've been having with this is trying to make uh a western theme sound distinctively western um because you know what is it that makes the western theme a western theme as opposed to just a superhero theme or a big film theme a lot of the time they are drawing on little elements of americana of one description or another particularly um those kind of um little um uh sort of hoedowny banjo licks that kind of thing um and also the open playing open strings on fiddles so a lot of it goes and lots of open fits for that same reason okay right i'm just gonna kick off and do stuff here because we haven't got time to mess around except there's nothing coming out why would that be i wonder some short strings and i'm going to put these in are we going to start with this i don't know if i'm going to start with this but i'm i'm going to just we're going to need this at some point so we're going to stick them in now so here we go and i'm going to stick them in using um uh step input here we go so we got quantize the sixteenths because we're going to put them in a sixteenths [Music] that's got quite a quite a nice kind of little um uh sort of wild westy feel to it i'm i think i'm going to start with some big stabs though actually um [Music] that kind of thing and then we'll support that with some um okay i can move those i copy those onto the bases and take the top off and so we've got the bottoms do it i could copy those onto the see this is how i why i use quite a lot of um ensemble patches to place stuff in because i like uh okay take the bottoms off the bottom octave off [Music] what's going on here [Music] uh i think i've deleted too much there so let's put them back come on you can do it guys keep keep keep the pressure keep the speed up keep the speed up um what's going on here we go take off these bottom octaves that's what i was trying to do [Music] okay mix in a bit of the ensemble [Music] okay um let's go with some trombone shorts bass trombone on the bottom [Music] okay bit of a short tuber maybe [Music] let's just check that there's a tuber i had a strange thing loaded up before a tube yeah a short tube oh is that you yeah that's a tuba good and we're just going to copy that down so they're all the same that's had some percussion [Music] then we're going to put stuff on the top of this and it's all going to be great trust me [Music] we're gonna have some temps on there and some bass drum [Music] okay so far so good now i'm cooking cooking cooking i am what have we got okay let's have a bit of bass drum in there are we doing see yep looks like we are okay um okay here we go snare [Music] yeah i like that but no i'm okay do i really want to trail this am i going to lead into it or i'm just going to hit it i'm going to hit it first time [Music] let's go with that symbols piarti [Music] now what i don't want is that i want i want it choked that sounds like it [Music] no didn't like that [Music] also i've gone off the i've gone off the little snare thing i'm just gonna go [Music] okay that's all right so it's starting to sound quite meaty now uh but we haven't really got anything going on yet um so this is just the lead-in um are we gonna use this uh violin thing as well [Music] okay that works working at speed here at um right let's i want more of that though am i going to have it in octaves maybe i'm going to have it in octaves they're a bit quieter at the moment so i'm going to have to whack them up [Music] okay that's all right let's take these drums down a bit because they're a bit on the thumpy side [Music] okay come on we need some more [Music] let's have a bit more gain on the uh [Music] okay now let's kick in good you can't have a great yeah uh while west theme without the brass this hat is ridiculous okay hello brass right let's go for we've got lots of choice um four trumpets uh legato with a mercato start how about that four trumpets with uh here we go let me show you look so we got it's legato but with a mercato start sorry bruce it's such a good two the trouble is bruce broughton he's a wonderful tune writer and as soon as you hear one of his tunes it just sticks in your brain you can't get rid of it uh so i'm now gonna have to try and write a tune which isn't a straight lift of silverado which would be a crying ship but also uses that [Music] okay we could do a fan fairy thing like that [Music] something like that okay now let's add another layer to it uh what's this one trump it's a six do you really need six trumpets guy no but it's fun so why not [Music] that's starting to sound quite westerny [Music] the crescendo on the end [Music] [Applause] that was a bit late it's also a bit high it's not in the perfect you know just because a trumpet can play that high it doesn't necessarily mean i mean it's not that high um [Music] you can't even see it on the camera it's so hot i mean they go up to there's this sort of top c thing and that's fine it's not always 100 reliable anything above that and you're into really dangerous territory unless you know 100 the individual brass player this is true of all brass instruments actually you know you go above the suggested range at your peril unless you know the individual in question in which case some people are just blimey or riley hats off mate they're really good at it and you know but you need to be careful that's the crescendo okay so where are we going to put this we're going to do quite like the mixtures of fourths and fifths is a very westerny sort of thing how about that now let's add some horns to this um little [Music] no the ghost of silverado [Music] okay quite like that um this is like you know um have we got a crescendo horn in here [Music] yep we do [Music] okay so far so good uh let's have a uh the tune's gonna kick in next so we're gonna go there and now we're gonna have a um where's the tim gone where's my i want to tim roll this time because it's special edition i don't have dedicated i don't have all those kind of clever roles and things which so i'm gonna have to do artificially [Music] which just by turning up the volume knob it's not quite the same it sounds alright though doesn't it and now we need a harp gliss one just like that vsl's original recording studio was quite dry and so you need to add quite a lot of reverb to it to make it sound good their new one the synchron stage is incr is really good right now now we need to get the tune how long have i been going how long about going oh we need we better make this quick because we're almost time up for my instant okay something like that it's not that i'm not just gonna say a job done uh okay i'm gonna put this on a second track and refer back to the first one okay here we go so we can go [Music] click would help where's the click gone come on quick okay let's mute these off for a minute starting to annoy me [Music] okay what happens okay it needs to slide [Music] all on okay these are all when you quantize things well you have to but [Music] uh okay move it all on [Music] jump jump oh oh no we don't do that we do that that's it come on it's coming together it's coming together don't lose faith guy keep going keep going [Music] okay then we go to the two big one okay so now now you've got to get going with the tune because we're running out of time and we need to um uh get your tune going on uh trumpets okay [Music] okay no that's not working for me at all [Music] right [Music] okay i like the tune uh i mean honestly what what am i thinking you can just do this in real time [Music] [Applause] [Music] something like that [Music] no again come on [Music] okay the the tune slightly off actually well what do you expect doing it at the speed of light okay so look here we go let's sort this out first [Music] sorting out is boring and so this is going to be extra fast and hugh is now going to speed me up while i sort it out there if only all of life could be all the boring bits could be speeded up like that but tragically that's not how life works okay so um if we're having that um uh top line on the trumpet we haven't used any woodwind yet which is a classic error so without going because we're working at speed of light um what are we going to do we're going to support [Music] [Applause] okay let's uh now i'm just going to call this today in a minute because it's getting there it's getting there it's not yet there but it's getting [Music] okay so we're gonna have some short uh some short horns supporting this [Music] are we or are we gonna go back with our trombones uh let's just look at the timing of the the tune itself my [Music] [Music] that is a bloody good tune trumpet sample um this is let me let me just take a second to acknowledge the wonderfulness of this trumpet sample this is solo trumpet and what you get the choice of look is confortist yes auto speed so the legato speed changes and con vibrato so you get that [Music] we want this to be less that's a good test of a brass library as well how well does it do quiet [Music] let's do that let's dab one of those and i'm gonna [Music] okay now now we're gonna have a uh bottom line we're gonna have a counter line in the horns i think [Music] me [Music] a bit of a choir and then we're done uh where's the choir where's my quick quick quick you're coming out of time you're coming out of town for the uh [Music] [Applause] ah [Music] okay one more thing would just support this with tiffany [Music] uh too much choir now i should learn uh take those two out so it just comes in on the four and four okay and uh are we doing [Applause] [Music] all right that works [Music] okay and one that didn't record nevermind uh retro record it did okay now we're going to have one big last chord and then i could ride off into the sunset because time is up uh so then we're going to go back to the uh that's me off into the sunset i'm gone i'm gone solid gone man uh where is trombones there we go shall we turn them on into a crescendo dynamics crescendo strong two seconds four seconds what happens four seconds [Music] that is a meaty crescendo [Music] i'll do and uh we need anything else uh [Music] [Applause] we could do some string now come on ensemble i bet we've got an ensemble crescendo in here somewhere uh long notes sense talk about choice talk about dynamics here we go crescendo long [Music] too long sorry maybe i'm just really impatient and just run out of patience that'll do [Music] [Applause] it's not the most elegant of endings and we haven't used any woodwind and normally you'd use a lot of woodwind in something like this but look you know what are you expecting half an hour look we've done a western theme in 30 minutes i mean go blimey i know i'd like to see elmer bernstein do that oh no i'm sure [Music] four or four five [Music] [Applause] and so guy rides off into the sunset yeah there we go so that's it the western special such as it was lightning quick all kind of sh quick as a quick draw yeah quick quick draw composition you see that's what's been going on here today oh god it's exhausting doing this sometimes okay um that is the whole thing that is it done and i hope you enjoyed it and thought it was a bit of a laugh go and have a go at um uh the old uh western theme yourself uh and uh check out bruce's score to silverado because it's absolutely wonderful it's really really good and you can get a copy of the score itself the full orchestral score from omni music publishing who are who deserve a medal for being the most wonderful people um for publishing all these classic uh scores and their stuff is just absolutely amazing so omni music publishing bruce broughton silverado those are two things i encourage you to check out if you're new to the channel welcome and um we produce courses in how to do stuff like this sampled orchestration and film scoring uh you're welcome madam um and so why don't you check those out as well and i'll be back next week with another exciting episode of whatever this is called anyway lightning quick quick draw scoring or something anyway see you soon bye

Channel: Guy Michelmore

Views: 54,720

Keywords: thinkspace, education, music, film, scoring, games, television, composition, composer, guy michelmore, guy, michelmore, thinkspace education, Music Educaiton, Cubase, Cubase 11, Steinberg, VSL, Vienna Symphonic Library, VSL Brass, Western Music, Cowboy Music, Writing Wild West Music, Composing Wild West Music, Wild West Music, Scoring Wild West, vsl synchron brass, brass samples, vst review, orchestration online, orchestral mockup, orchestral tutorial

Id: oDrkibnMBiU

Length: 32min 30sec (1950 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 20 2021