Exercise from Ch. 2 of “Composing Music” wanted a chord progression. A single path chord progression could be done but that would not take advantage of the alternative routes in Nodal. There is a bit of difficulty in that the root note needs to send out parallel signals to the others in the triad. This would also mean a parallel sending of signals to subsequent chords which would have many chords simultaneously firing rather than a progression.
The chord itself is a group of 3 modes connected by wormholes. It makes it easier if you use relative note specification e.g. node 1 D3, node 2 +3, node 3 +7. There is one allowed additional edge which is connected to a mute sequentially firing node. This mute node can have multiple edges to other chords which creates the variety of pathways.
The multiple pathways do make it more difficult to follow the basic rules for diatonic chord progressions. It could be solved like the travelling salesman graph type of problem.
This is the starting structure of a Nodal project I am working on. The idea came to me as I watched the Melbourne Storm rugby league club winning a grand final. There is a starting action, a series of up to six actions which can be ended after any one of the actions and the an ending action which goes back to a starting action. In league it could be a kick off followed by some tackles which end in a score or fumble of turnover. The process then restarts. Each of the types of actions has a number of options relevant to that action. It is note a complete model in music of a rugby league game but just a starting idea to try out different musical structures.
Nodal makes it easy to visualise and construct these structures. I was going to post the music but it does not sound right. I need to work on the notes within the actions and the instrumentation.
This is an early Nodal composition based on the “Imperial flute” exercise in “Composing Music” by William Russo. You can only use E, G, A, or B in any order with the 5/4 rhythm as 1/4, 1/4, 1/4, 1/2 notes.
The image to the left is the first iteration to set the rhythm. The notes contain notes in different amounts and combinations such e3, g3, a3, b3 or a3, b3, or a3, a3, g3, b3, b3. The velocity is values around 64.
Different notes will sound as the song plays from node to node. One advantage with Nodal is that non linear sections can be drawn in with ease and random paths can be specified. In this case the final version of the song is below. I liked the way the shape developed. Nodal reminds me a lot of the Japanese game of Go. It is not just the obvious similarities with the grid and nodes but that the rules are not complicated yet it can yield complex results. Nodal also feels like a logical game when laying out the nodes and lines.
Nodal is a music composition program which uses nodes and lines for the description and generation of music. You can get more information and download Nodal at: http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~cema/nodal/
Finally got my Teenage Engineering OP-1. Great design, a few bugs with usable if not spectacular sounds.
A few days with the OP-1 . I also uploaded some presets:
