On the right is an archival recording of the same piece in its original form as a march.

I re-harmonized the song and recorded a piano / vocal performance. Later, I wrote the string arrangement and recorded it with a quartet in a separate overdubbing session.

I Thought A String Section Would Be Nice

Originally, I was going to bring in a rhythm section and do the song as a typical modern ballad. But I didn’t have a lot of time to submit my initial recording and I couldn’t get the musicians I wanted in the time I had. Fate helped me make the decision to just do it myself. But I love working with strings and this song was a perfect candidate for that. So I told Ed and he cleared it with the powers that be. Then we scheduled the string session piggy-backed onto a session he had going with another artist he was working with in Nashville. I was so busy at the time but I really wanted to do go a step farther and come up with a sweet string arrangement . So I did.

It seems that strings are always an afterthought for a recording these days because money is always an issue and no one knows how much of it they’re going to have until they dive into a recording. So whenever I arrange strings for a project, more often than not, the basic recording is finished and the section goes in as an overdub. There are Pros and Cons to this.

Cons: The opportunity is missed from the beginning to see the performance with all the final elements as a whole. This means for example, I cannot tell the rhythm section to play certain rhythmic figures that will augment or support rhythms in the string parts. I cannot write parts for any of the previously recorded instruments that will interplay with the string parts because that moment in time is over. The pre-record, for the most part, is set in stone (not counting any digital magic you might want to perform).

Pros: Everything is set in stone. There will be no surprises. If I hear something interesting in the recorded track that I want to expand on into the string section, I can. I can still make the strings play off of any rhythm section motive that already exists. The vocal will not change. I can write between the cracks and know that the strings will not step on the vocal. They will only support it if I do my job correctly. All the chords and tensions will not change. So even if a player has altered a chord from the original arrangement, I will hear it and be able to write for the strings accordingly.

There are more Pros for writing for strings as an afterthought than there are for writing for horns as an afterthought. If the rhythm section didn’t play certain hits and didn’t know that horns were going to be added later, then its harder to make horns fit in at all. Its the nature of the beast. Contemporary horn writing ( rhythmic stabs, etc ) is very dependent on the support of the Rhythm Section kicks.

Using Technology To Get Real

The challenge I faced with Hail Columbia was that it was a rubato (not in strict time) performance. I wanted to be able to hear and revise my parts and practice my conducting before the session date. So I decided to use Logic ( Apple midi and digital recording software ) to help me with a a mock-up string performance.

I have a love/hate relationship with Logic in its current version. 7.x. I shouldn’t complain. I suppose I love it more than I hate it. These programs allow us to do amazing things. But anyone who has ever done anything on a computer knows how frustrating things can get. There are glitches in Logic 7. Making a tempo map is easy up until you reach a certain amount of bars, then something happens and you can’t keep track of where you are anymore. The waveform visual looses its relationship to the tempo map dots and you’re catapulted into flaming hell. What I ended up with was a lot of odd meter bars toward he end which I later corrected in Sibelius.

Basically this is the way a tempo map works. The program analyzes the audio that you want to map ( map - meaning track the tempo of a performance, where it speeds up and slows down). Then it tells you where all the noticeable rhythmic events were. In 4/4 time ( 1,2,3,4), if it analyzes a rock drum kit performance, then it has an easy job. The snare hits are really loud and regular on say, beats 2 and 4 of every bar. If a human being played the part (vs. a drum machine) then the tempo will speed up and slow down as time passes. The program will make note of this and let you know where it thinks the tempo is going and where beats 1, 2, 3 and 4 are based on the regularity of the kinds of hits it hears. Then with a mouse, you have to connect every theoretical beat 1, 2, 3, 4 to every actual beat 1, 2, 3, 4 of the analyzed performance. Sometimes the computer is wrong and you just have to tell it the right answer by connecting the correct place with the mouse. What made my tempo map harder to create was that the program had to analyze a piano performance which does not have the regularity of a drum kit performance. Sometimes I had to connect to a place on the waveform that had no visible rhythmic event but really was on beat 1, 2, 3 or 4, taking into account the fuzziness of a rubato performance. Confused? Sorry, that’s the best I could do.

Back To The Real Strings

When I’m writing string parts, I listen carefully to what’s going on in the pre-recorded track and in the moment I respond to it with my voice. I’m basically improvising as a vocalist but with the sensibility of a string section. I keep in mind the character of the instrument or section I’m writing for and sing what feels good. I write down and incorporate the ideas that make me cry or laugh, depending on what the piece calls for. If you listen carefully, there are opportunities to create rhythmic interest or tension. And there are times to let a solo instrument speak or have the whole group play softly together and be pretty. It all has to support and make sense with the melody.

For this session, we overdubbed the whole string quartet (2 violins, 1 viola, 1 cello) twice. Then the violins did yet another pass by themselves. All of the standard string configurations are violin heavy.
In this case our recording sounds like 6 violins, 2 violas and 2 cellos.

So much about your writing depends on how many players you have in a section or how many times you will be able to overdub to make those parts thicker, warmer and more fluid sounding. If you don’t double or triple a small section ( our quartet for example ) then your writing as well as their tuning has to be flawless. I had never worked with such a great string section before this.

Consult some contemporary arranging books for tips. I have Don Sebesky’s “The Contemporary Arranger” lying around. You will learn more than ever by hearing your own work back from project to project. Synths and String samples can only hint at what can be done. The subtlety of the real instruments is amazing. I have no formal training in string arranging. I just have a love and a knack for the limited kind of work I do with it. I’ve learned along the way. I’m not a speedy arranger like my friend and sometimes co-writer, Michael Tavera, (film score composer) or like Jeff Holmes (whose arranging class I took while at Umass many moons ago). But I do, thoughtfully and well, what I do.

Some hints about putting strings into a recording.

If you have to use a synth or samples, at least play each part separately with its own midi track. Then spend the time tweaking volume and velocity so you can imitate the dynamics of a real section. Get a basic mix between the string parts themselves, then link them together to control their dynamics in a mix as a section. If you stack too many parts, everything will become muddy. Keep it as simple as you can. Think melodically.

If you’re putting together a real section for the first time, make sure that you find players who play together as much as possible. It is much better when the group thinks as one and can communicate quickly due to their prior experience with each other. Develop a rapport with the leader of the section and strive to communicate what you want and hear while entrusting the players to teach you what you don’t know. I don’t even bother to write in bow markings because chances are they will be changed at the session. Ask the section to perform certain passages with different articulations. You will hear the difference on the spot and they will write in the articulation you decide upon. I am always strong about my artistic concepts but have open ears when someone I’m working with has more experience in a particular area.

Be prepared! There’s nothing like that feeling of everything falling apart in the studio or onstage when you know there was more you could have done to prepare. Especially when you’re going to be dealing with people you don’t know, anything can happen. Big egos and edgy attitudes abound. When the musicians sense that you have your act together, they will play better for you. I promise. Learn what you have to learn to run the session. Then admit what you don’t know and you will get help from others instinctively. You can fake it up to a point. After that, beware. The first thing I said to the highly experienced string session players before the run-through for Hail Columbia was, “I’m not a conductor but you might need my help to get through this rubato performance. When you feel comfortable with the material I’d be happy to get out of your way. Let me know when you reach that point.” With that, I had let them know that there was something I wanted to oversee and achieve but that I understood and trusted their high level of skill and experience.

Video

Just in case you were wondering about the video. Its been sort of a passion of mine lately. There is so much available to us now in the digital age. I have two Panasonic, 3 chip camcorders that are at the “pro-sumer” level. They are easy to use. For this video, I had set them up at two different stationary angles during the piano/vocal recording. I took just one of the camcorders with me to Nashville for the string session. While I conducted, it was propped on a gobo. After two passes, they didn’t need me anymore and I was free to be cameraman as they played the last overdub. I edited the video in Final Cut Express. Years ago, this would have been so much harder and more expensive to do. I wouldn’t have bothered. Now, you don’t even need time code to keep the video and audio locked. The audio from the camcorder footage and the audio from the final mix can fairly easily be lined up in Final Cut Express. They stay locked because everything is digital. You just have to be patient when you’re sliding tracks into place. Just about anything is possible now if you want to be a slave to your computer. Which reminds me, I’d better get to bed. And I promise that I’ll practice tomorrow instead of working on this web page again.


* recording engineer for the piano vocal session - Mark Thayer at Signature Sounds ( Pomfret ,CT )
string session and mix by - Bob Ohlson ( Java Jive Studio - Nashville,TN )


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