Highly Sensitive
TRACK DATA
Composition tool: MuseScore 3, Studio One 6.5 Professional
Recording tool (DAW): Studio One 6.5 Professional
Number of tracks: 49
Sound source: Presence XT, Impact XT, Sample One, Maitai (All built-in sound sources of Studio One)
Composition and recording period: Nov 25 2023 - Dec 12 2023, Feb 21 2024
How a Highly Sensitive Person sees the world
(TM writes:)
It's rare for us to have the title before completion. "Highly Sensitive" came from a psychological term of "Highly Sensitive Person." When I read books on it, I was surprised that it was quite applicable to me, especially in my youth.
So, this is based on an idea that came to my mind of how a highly sensitive person sees the world. But it should vary depending upon the person, this is just MY case. Although most of FMT's works have an artistic or mathematical concept, this doesn't. I composed it quite sensually and introspectively. It's another endeavour to search for a new concept as well. (I don't feel I've found one, though.)
It's difficult to articulate the "world", but I can say, there are very direct stimuli from outside, strong impulse and imagination, and innocence.
This piece is designed this way; on the basis of a 5-notes scale (like A#, C#, D#, F#, G#), atonality is added. For example, the 16th-notes phrase on the piano includes F and B. Thus, it's a Phrygian mode starting from A# (ie, A#, B, C#, D#, F, F#, G#). But later, the accordion uses C and the synth some other like D. I wonder if it's tonal or atonal, (or, either major or minor should it be tonal,) which is my intention. The composition was made very quickly.
(TI writes:)
For this piece, I made very few changes from the score TM wrote in MuseScore. For the string parts, I just broke them down into individual parts for the violin, viola and cello, according to the register of the original piece. The tones are basically the same as those used in MuseScore.
In contrast, various processing has been done in the mix.
The overall emphasis is on the mid-range (from around 200 to 1 kHz), and the lo-fi atmosphere is gradually amplified towards the latter half of the song. Specifically, the noise component is increased, the noise is increased in the image of dust noise on vinyl records, the pitch is randomly shaken and the playback speed of each track is changed to create a wow-flutter-like effect on tape (though the basic tempo is not changed).
The left and right phases are also shifted and panning is used to reproduce a tinnitus-like image, which is how I can hear sounds around me sometimes when I am tired.
As we are sometimes asked about how to create FMT's sounds in the low frequency range (below 150Hz), we have divided the bandwidth of the bass drum (BD) and bass, being conscious of the combination of the rhythm and the sound of the bass, and emphasized the area around 150Hz for BD and cut the area below 75Hz, while the bass was cut in the opposite direction. The bass is adjusted so that 40-75Hz sounds as the central band.
The compressors on the drums other than the BD are adjusted to make them sound more backwards than in conventional FMT tracks.
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