Happy 4th of July!
Today I chose the following quest for the 21-day Composition Challenge day 4 :
- Drum Machine: Write an entire piece using ONLY unpitched percussion instruments (that means no xylophones, pianos, etc).
I actually decided to choose this one last night. I heard the sound of fireworks last night (somebody was already cerebrating 4th of July then!), it reminded me of Japanese Matsuri (festival). I grew up in Sumida area in Tokyo, which is famous for the Sumida River Fireworks Festival. Also, since my mom is from Aomori prefecture, I grew up with Nebuta Matsuri as well. For me, Summer = Fireworks = MATSURI!!
Anyway, to create this track, I decided to use as many Japanese percussion sounds I own as possible. Here’s the list of the instruments I used :
- 大太鼓 (Taiko)
- 小太鼓 (Kodaiko, Small Taiko)
- 締太鼓 (Shime -Daiko)
- 中太鼓(Chu-Daiko, Medium Taiko)
- 桶胴太鼓 (Okedo-Daiko)
- ちゃんちき(Chanchiki)
- 手拍子(Tebyoushi)
- 拍子木(Hyoushigi)
I went big and used them all, but usually they don’t use this many instruments in Matsuri. Also they’ll have melodic instruments like Fue’ (Japanese flutes) as well.
Here’s my Day 4 track : Matsuri Daiko (Festival Taiko). To make it a little fun and unique, I made the meter to be 5/4.
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
(UPDATED September 2018)
I went ahead and finalized this sketch! Now it’s available at our Royalty-Free Music Shop, so please check this out!
