Music 220A - Final Project: Computer Generated FM Remix - Isaac Ramos

Overview of Project

There were several components to this project with an underlying theme being playing with the vibrato threshold of FM. In class we learned that past a modulation frequency of about 10, humans begin to perceptive FM as continuous sound. I played with this fact all throughout my piece. For this piece I got the remix stems for the song "My Oh My" by Tristan Prettyman. Specifically, I used the drum, bass, and vocal track as inspiration for my own version of the song by creating 6 computer generated tracks then mixing them together. I created each of the 6 tracks in ChucK, brief descriptions along with the ChucK code links are Wav files are presented below:

• Bass.ck: The bass for this track was created by taking the original bass line from "My Oh My" and running it through a frequency tracker. This frequency then controlled the frequency of an FM note which was created with a BlitSaw modulated by a Sin. Similarly, the volume of the note was dependant on the volume of the original bass track. The note was passed through a LPF whose cut-off was also controlled by a sinusoid dependant on the time in the song.
  Bass.wav
  
  
• highFM.ck: This lead track was created by making a harmonic-rich FM sound generated via Sin modulation of a Triangle carrier and randomly choosing an index of modulation such that the vibrato was somewhere between non-existant and almost indistinguishable. The base note was high to generate the lead sound (66-MIDI) and changes once per second.
  highFM.wav
  
  
• lowFM.ck: This is identical to the highFM track with the exception of the note base frequency (48-MIDI) and the interval between changes which is 312ms.
  lowFM.wav
  
  
• Mandolin.ck: This lead track was created by using the ChucK built in Mandolin instrument. The drum track from the original song was amplitude and frequency tracked and these parameters were then used to control the gain, pluck, and frequency of the mandolin. The speed of the notes was varied continuously throughout the song to be either 2 or 4 plucks per beat.
  Mandolin.wav
  
  
• Vocals_Slow.ck: The first vocal track was created by pitch shifting the original vocal track by a random amount (between 0.5x and 2x) at random times between 300ms and 3000ms. This created an interesting effect while the listener is still able to hear clear melody in the vocals.
  Vocals_Slow.wav
  
  
• Vocals_Fast.ck: The second vocal track was created by pitch shifting the original vocal track by a random amount (between 0.5x and 2x) at random times between 100ms and 200ms. This created more of a robot like melody where the listener is no longer able to distinguish words or phrases because the changing pitch occurs at a threshold that is so quick it can't be perceived normally.er
  Vocals_Fast.wav
  
  

Final Mix

Each of the tracks listed above contains inspiration from the original "My Oh My" track. However, when I put them together I still did not feel like they merged well. Therefore, I added the original drum track and it brought everything together very nicely. I also did some mixing to demonstrate contrasts between my tracks and avoid complete chaos. My hope is that the user feels as though randomness is prevalent in the song but is still able to appreciate the organization and machine sounds inspired by the original track. Below are links to my final mixed and mastered track along with the original "My Oh My" song.

My Final Track

Tristan Prettyman - My Oh My