Fortnightly Update #6
Welcome to the sixth music update of the year
I have been working, of course, on the Imperialism Reinvigorated main theme!
It is turning out to be a fun piece to write and I have been enjoying playing with some of the more unusual time signatures and rhythmic constructions out there. For example, previously I talked about using 9/8 for the beginning of the piece. The excerpt below is in 14/8, which I don't think I've ever seen used anywhere. This time signature is, in some sense, equivalent to 7/4 (which is a lot more common), but in this case there are not seven even beats (2+2+2+2+2+2+2), but instead four beats of three followed by a beat of two (3+3+3+3+2). It feels entirely different; funky, hence the bongos you can hear.
Another part of the music that I am enjoying is linking it back to Themes of the Old World through the Land of Wonder theme, which I have previously talked about. Listen again to the excerpt below and do you notice the similarities in melody when the violins come in? it is not the exact same, particularly given Land of Wonder is in 4/4 and this is in 14/8, but I've also partially inverted it and tinkered a bit. Effectively what this means is where the music previously went up by a note it now goes down by a note. The intervals and jumps between the notes are all the same, just in the other direction!
Work on the main theme continues as I look to start wrapping up its development and moving onto the two supplementary pieces that will be coming with the mod... but more on that later
Enjoy and see you in two weeks!
- Utopia