Film music composer and production company -  David Beard Music Production -    Supplying music and sound design to commercial multimedia. Specialising in composing music and sound design for the moving image David Beard Music Production creates original music for film, TV, corporate video, commercials, games, dance, theatre and Podcasts.

Minimal    By TV and Film Music Composer - David Beard, Inspired by works of composers such as John Adams, John Cage, Steve Reich, etc. A common constraint in minimalist music was for the composer to give the musicians two choices, that of either playing or not playing the given rhythm and pitch, which is usually a small one or two bar phrase. Composer Steve Reich's 'The Clapping Song' was built on a one-bar phrase performed by two players - with a quaver beat of that phrase changing position for one of the players every 4 bars to create an ever changing rhythm as the position of that movement continued until it was back to its original position. This piece follows a similar rule and consists of one-bar phrases. The overall pulse of the piece is a simple quadruple pulse (4/4) but some individual elements of six quaver beats to the bar (6/8) and five crotchet beats to a bar (5/4) produce a polyrhythmic texture forming an ever-changing tapestry of sound, first in the foreground, then moving to the background whilst other elements take over, and finally to the foreground to end the piece as it started. The grid below shows how often these one-phrase bars of varying beat lengths are in line with each other.

The first 'rhythm' to be heard is the first piano part, setting the pace and feel:

Piano 1

followed shortly after by the second piano part playing in its own 6/8 rhythm, staggered at first but continuous once the third element has started:

Piano 2

Dance & Theatre Children's Music Documentaries & Commercial Library Music 90's Synth Music A Darker Side Minimal Nowhere Mothersland The Opening Ctrl+Alt+Del Catharsis Daddy Claw Other Film Music Film Festivals So you want to be a film composer - Lucas Kendall (pdf)

The third element to enter is the bass marimba. With its own 5/4 rhythm; again with a staggered entrance but continuous once the fourth element enters:

Bass Marimba

The fourth element is another 6/8 rhythm, played on the vibes:

Vibes

and the fifth, a low pulse every crotchet beat played on the harp:

Harp 1

A syncopated higher harp part follows this causing an interesting interaction with the first piano part:

Harp 2

Because of the different number of beats to a bar of some of the single bar phrases, beat '1' only occurs simultaneously every 15 4/4 Bars :

Click on the links below to hear music examples :-

Minimal - Full Version 6:28 (98kBit/sec quality)

Minimal - Hotel Mix 0:39

Minimal - Underscore 0:57

Minimal - Ad 1 0:16

Minimal - Ad 2 0:18

Minimal - Sting 0:08

Minimal -  Extract 2:26

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