ABLETON SESSION 1

I made use of automation to help me achieve this which I will highlight below:

For the arpeggiated melody, I used a Flanger plugin to create a spacey effect which slots into the genre that I took my track down which is the cinematic/soundtrack genre. I set it to a low rate (6) but the amount to 100% as I didn’t want too much of it to clash with the arpeggiated rhythm of the melody. I then used automation to have it start slow and then gradually increase the rate over the course of the track to aid in building it up.

For the chorus overlay track, I automated the panning on these audio files so that it would consistently and smoothly move left to the right for the entirety that it played. I decided to do this as I felt it would create a unique experience for the listener.

After working on this I decided to add some of my own elements to complement what was already provided to me. I inputted the notes for the MIDI instruments using the Oxygen25 MIDI keyboard. I added some bass hits through Wavetable to complement what was already there. I set Oscillator 1 to the Galactica wave at 74% and Oscillator 2 to the Quad Saw wave which I then automated to go from 0% to 94% as it created a distorted almost metallic sound.

I added 2 hits using the Werstuecktraeger (WST) instrument as it had the Sci-Fi sound I was looking for as it added an unusual sound and extra layer to the track.

I then added some chords using a pad near the end after I had faded some of the tracks out. I made sure these notes were played high as the rest of the track has a lot of low-end, so I wanted to add something with high frequency content to cut through the low end and add extra texture.