I've been absent for a while, but I was stuck sick at home today with a copy of BiaB 2015...

What else to do, but write a song?

Love's Forgotten Song
dreams are only for the young
bright sun as the day's begun
like an open road right in front of us
past the ever bright star
here we are

lovers and the closest friends
once gone never coming back again
you held your hand in mine only yesterday
now that memory is all that remains

so we somehow came apart
still you live in my secret heart
holding deep inside the saddest part of me
i can never quite say goodbye, goodbye

words to our forgotten song
once known but now we sing it wrong
now we can't recall that sweet melody
only comes to me now in my dreams

Song info:
Style is _B140GTB.STY (Bossa Brazilian Quartet (140 RS))
~464:Bass, Acoustic, Bossa Ev 140
~470:Piano, Acoustic, Rhythm Bossa Ev 140
~467:Guitar, Electric, Rhythm Bossa Ev 140
704:Flute, Soloist Bossa Ev 140
BossaBrushes: a: Sidestick Brushes b: Sidestick, Ride

I was originally inspired by R & AM's track 2015 but I ended finding a Bossa Nova RealTrack I liked, so went that route instead. The chord progression is auto-generate using the Melodist feature.

I tried auto-generating some melodies, but nothing struck my fancy, so I went into notation mode and clicked and dragged notes until it sounded melodic. No doubt I've accidentally copied something from a distant memory...

I listened to the song in loop mode and started typing words to fit the syllables - not the typical way I work, but it was apparently quite successful for Phil Collins. I was thinking about those subtitled foreign films, where the lyrics are "proper" English, but feel a bit "stiff"... I think I succeeded!

I printed out the melody from BiaB, and entered the melody into Vocaloid. I tweaked it in some places to fit the words a bit better, and then exported .wav files.

I exported the backing tracks from BiaB as .wav files as well, and built the mix in Reaper. The flute solo was cut-and-pasted together, and I fiddled with the mix for a while until ennui settled in.

Then I struggled for a while with SoundCloud, until it decided it wanted to play nice again.

As always, any comment is welcome (although given my extended absence, undeserved). The tempo is probably a bit too fast, and the rhythm stilted in places, but hey...

Dave,
Very pleasant tune and arrangement. I hope you feel better soon.
SD

Thanks, SD!

I'm doing better (just a cold), but now I'm fighting SoundCloud, which has again decided not to play back tracks that BiaB folk have posted. It's gotten irritating enough that I finally sent it a support ticket...

-- David

Beautiful song, vocal is superb. thanks for sharing!

Thanks, Robert.

It was a bit of a challenge to get Avanna to sing "young". It was correct phonetically (j V N, in case you're curious), but different vowels on the preceding word would make her sing "yahng". There are still some words (like "open") that I could go back and tweak, but I should probably leave it alone now.

By the way, I'm still trying to get SoundCloud to play songs (such as your song Peace), but I'm not having any luck. It seems to be hit or miss what SoundCloud is going to play.

I've tried 3 different web browsers and a Chromebook, with no luck on any of them. I got an auto-response from SoundCloud to the effect of "check your browser and make sure you're up to date", which isn't the issue. Since I have similar issues from my work environment, I suspect it's a geographic issue. In any event, I hope they get this resolved soon!

Thanks again!

-- David

David, that first verse grabbed us
immediately. Great lyric! How you
folks are able to do such impressive
work with the vocaloid never ceases
to amaze.

The comped flute track works really
well.

It all worked for us. Nice!!

J&B

Hi, Janice and Bud.

I'm glad you liked it. The Vocaloid software does most of the work, it's just a matter of convincing the program to sing the words the right way!

Sometimes that turns out to be much harder than it should. I hear there's a new English singing Vocaloid in the works that has an American provider, but from what I've heard, the vocal has a much harder edge than what I'm looking for.

Of course, it's nothing like the vocals on your tracks, but it's a lot better than nothing at all! You two keep blowing me away with your bluesy songs.

Thanks!

-- David

You write such pretty songs with some great lyrics! I feel you should get a live vocalist to really show them off. Flute solo works beautifully as do the instrument tracks. Cool song!! Take care. Greg

Hi David,

nice tune and arrangement. I especially like the repeated parts.
I know about the pronunciation problems of Avanna.
The flute is a hit.
Wish you get along with your own synthetic singer.

Guenter

Sounds really good. The tone of Avanna combined with the melody and instruments you've chosen seems to remind me of something I would hear in an early James Bond movie.

Nice song. I enjoyed listening.

Charlie

This is a great sounding track, the first Vocaloid example I think I have heard. It's different, not quite human of course, but quite a pleasant instrument. Much like BIAB RealTracks in a way - if you work at it, the results are often better than you could realistically expect! I was sorta hoping that when the AI's and robots finally become our overlords that we humans would at least keep the singing and songwriting gig, but I guess not.

The melody and arrangement (auto chords?!?) are very nice and the flute part really rocks. Unusual process but it worked well!

Thanks,
Bruce

Hi, Greg.
Yes, I'd love to have a real vocalist!

But I'll confess that it's nice to be able to revise lyrics at two o'clock in the in the morning and not wake anyone up.

-- David

Hi, Guenter.

Yeah, we fight all the time.

But really, I'm hoping I'll get some time to work on synSinger later this month. I've already put together a prototype to test out a new approach. So far, the results are encouraging.

-- David

Hi, Charlie.

I really like the tone of Avanna - voice provider and development team did an awesome job.

Apparently there's a female Vocaloid with an American voice provider in the works, but she's got a harder edge to the vocals.

Thanks for the positive feedback.

-- David

Hi, Bruce.

If you're curious, here are a couple more - The Gates of Babylon and Memory Eternal.


Thanks!

-- David

Hi David,
Took a listen to Love's Forgotten Song. Wow...Love it. Killer arrangement! Fun Tempo, original. Great lyric!
Carolyne

Thanks, I'm glad you liked it. I try to make sure there's a distinct change between the various parts, and dropping the drums on the fourth verse was pretty effective. I thing the vocals on the last verse might be a bit low, but I've got to stop fiddling with it at some point.

If you listen, you'll note there's a lot of ducking the piano and guitar under the vocal as well. As lovely as BiaB instruments are, Vocaloids are difficult to understand in the best of times, so I only pull those instruments up during breaks in the vocal or on held syllables... A lot of micro-editing!

-- David

Hi David,
Like the chill out atmosphere. Nice songwriting.
Enjoyed it !
Fred

"...I was thinking about those subtitled foreign films, where the lyrics are "proper" English, but feel a bit "stiff"... I think I succeeded!"

that is EXACTLY what I thought as I listened!!

The arrangement and mix are terrific - although the "drop" of the instrument levels was "noticeable". Leaving the drums out was an excellent effect. Lowering the piano, sounded like..lowering a piano track. Perhaps it would better to drop it, too and let the guitar take that one alone?...

I enjoy reading what your process is. It's interesting and different - and effective.

I listened a number of times.. and enjoyed it.

One last thing... YOU should be singing your songs. The "girls" are very impressive. But you are better.

floyd

David,

Them cold bugs produced a wonderful song.

I am fascinated by your, and Guenter's,productions with synthvoices. This shows them to perfection.

Nice tune by the way.

I look forward to more.

Alyn