# So, do you really need Divisi in your cinematic cues?



## HarmonyCore (Jun 26, 2020)

Hey Everyone,

When it comes to cinematic cues, I don't really follow the traditional method of orchestration except for panning. Divisi? well, I am not sure of that. I experimented it by distributing the chord tones among two groups of the violin I section (split it in half) and it sounds very thin. I am all about the thickness and richness of the overall voice of an epic orchestra tracks like the ones I hear from Two Steps From Hell. The thinness result of the experiment makes me ask if Bergersen and Phoenix actually use Divisi in their music? I don't know that's why I am here to find out.

Do you guys create your thing using the traditional orchestration guidelines or the "If sounds good, go for it" guideline?
Which one?


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## Selfinflicted (Jun 26, 2020)

I'm guessing you're talking about keeping everything in the computer.

Using divisi sounds smaller because it is (more) accurately representing what happens with a real string section. Write divisi and you're going to get half the number of players on the note. This is extremely useful if you want a realistic sound, especially if you're doing a mockup that will eventually be recorded. Otherwise, play a chord with a say a violin patch and you suddenly have a violin section that is 3 times bigger than it was/should be.

If you're going to stay with samples, I just generally try to write like I would write for a real orchestra. Not doing so tends to expose the samples more for what they are - not the real thing. In my experience, the more you know about orchestration and have experience with live instruments, the easier it is to have samples sounds like the real thing. Bergersen's stuff sounds great. I'm willing to bet he understands orchestration well.

You see more divisi writing for large to very large string section in concert music. So, with those large string sound sample libraries, the notes tend to build up quickly when you play chords. It's good to be able to write for strings without using divisi. The orchestra is not the piano.

But, at the end of the day - just do whatever sounds best. Music is sound, so make it sound good.


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## HarmonyCore (Jun 26, 2020)

Selfinflicted said:


> I'm guessing you're talking about keeping everything in the computer.
> 
> Using divisi sounds smaller because it is (more) accurately representing what happens with a real string section. Write divisi and you're going to get half the number of players on the note. This is extremely useful if you want a realistic sound, especially if you're doing a mockup that will eventually be recorded. Otherwise, play a chord with a say a violin patch and you suddenly have a violin section that is 3 times bigger than it was/should be.



Thanks for taking the time to reply 

What I am actually doing is distributing chord tones among all the strings section, not only one group. For example, I assign one chord tone to Vln I, Vln II, Vla, Celli, and Basses to be played in its own register. I use a lot of perfect octave, 5ths, and a little bit of 3rds because it's not powerful as octave and 5ths. This approach sounds very realistic and acceptable. Divisi, on the other hand, is to distribute the chord tones among only the Violins, or only the Violas and it sometimes confuses me on the piano roll in my DAW because I get lost on which group took which note. Of course, I never play a triad chord using a 12 players Violin patch. No, I will never write a mockup that will be recorded with real orchestra anytime soon. I am just a home composer who does everything inside the DAW and try to sell through sync licensing one day. 



Selfinflicted said:


> In my experience, the more you know about orchestration and have experience with live instruments,
> the easier it is to have samples sounds like the real thing.



I know a little bit of orchestration and I keep learning. I never had any experience with live orchestra in my life but I hope one day.


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## GNP (Jun 26, 2020)

Well, you'll need to learn proper orchestration in the event that you'll be recording with a live orchestra. It'll really help once that happens.

_But if there's no budget and everything is in the box_ - *I would write exactly the way you do; disregarding everything that is supposed to look good on paper and for live players. It's about the sound and getting the sound you want, and not about how to 'orchestrate properly'.*

So no worries man. It's good to learn orchestration, but until the day comes when you'll have to deal with a live orchestra, the way you're doing stuff to get a solid sound out of your DAW, is just as legit.


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## youngpokie (Jun 26, 2020)

I think it would be a misunderstanding to assume that the purpose of divisi in strings is only to distribute chord voicings.

That certainly has its place, especially when strings are more exposed and a complex chord is needed. The resulting sound would be rich and sophisticated but of course the usual octave-doubled tutti in _fff_ would completely drown it out.

Divisi can be used to achieve more expressive texture and sound - for example, a melody in con sordino and a divisi version of it in tremolo accents, both of which are then octave doubled in Vln II div. Or, a melody in spiccato and a divisi version that layers only beat accents in pizzicato. And if these melodies are further shaped and slightly thickened in unison by a solo woodwind they would sound exquisite.

These types of techniques work best in more quiet passages when few instruments are playing. But they are used in classical music as well as in film.


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## Snarf (Jun 26, 2020)

In addition to what everyone's said already and coming back to your initial TSFH example, Thomas Bergersen is a masterful orchestrator and absolutely uses divisi in his writing (although mostly in his less 'trailer-ish' music). However, he also augments his live orchestra recordings with his custom samples and subtle synths.

This means that it's not about either learning good orchestration OR doing whatever sounds good, it's actually about doing both! Moreover, proper orchestration actually makes for a 'better' sound in most cases.

More concretely though, if you're writing 'epic' music, you can probably get by without using divisi patches, especially if you don't like the sound of your divisi patches/mics, unless you want that thinner/ expressive texture for say a softer part of a track.


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## robgb (Jun 26, 2020)

You don't really need divisi for ANY cue, unless you're simply trying to mock-up an existing orchestral piece. And with movie scores, all bets are off. In other words, there are no rules. Literally.


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## Gene Pool (Jun 26, 2020)

robgb said:


> You don't really need divisi for ANY cue, unless you're simply trying to mock-up an existing orchestral piece. And with movie scores, all bets are off. In other words, there are no rules. Literally.



Saying _"You don't really need divisi for ANY cue..."_ sounds like a rule to me. You certainly need divisi if it produces the results you're after. As for film scores, divisi is used all the time, as needed.


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## robgb (Jun 26, 2020)

Gene Pool said:


> Saying _"You don't really need divisi for ANY cue..."_ sounds like a rule to me.


It's actually the opposite of a rule. The key phrase is here is "don't really." Which is not saying you shouldn't use it. The point I'm making, of course, is that the music you make and how you make it, is entirely up to you.


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## Gene Pool (Jun 26, 2020)

robgb said:


> It's actually the opposite of a rule.



Okay. Opposite of a rule.



robgb said:


> The point I'm making, of course, is that the music you make and how you make it, is entirely up to you.



That's fun to say on the internet, but in the big boy world when you're writing for musicians, for certain venues, for genres, for clients, etc., there are plenty of rules.


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## JJP (Jun 26, 2020)

robgb said:


> The point I'm making, of course, is that the music you make and how you make it, is entirely up to you.



The same can be said for writing prose or poetry. You can put whatever you want on the page however you like it. There are no rules.

If you want it to make sense or sound reasonably coherent, there are some specific rules of which you must, at the very least, be aware.


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## Gene Pool (Jun 26, 2020)

Pianissimo works fine when you mark it _fff_ and turn the volume all the way up. And 21 bassoons double very well with 79 cellos, cuz they equal 100.


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## Rasoul Morteza (Jun 26, 2020)

HarmonyCore said:


> Do you guys create your thing using the traditional orchestration guidelines or the "If sounds good, go for it" guideline?
> Which one?


Working with samples is a messy process. Don't expect to simply translate traditional writing techniques into a DAW and hear good results. Besides various forms of automation, often times you also have to layer patches and do things that make absolutely no sense outside the production environment, mainly due to the weaknesses of current libraries. However, and many overlook this, it is crucial for your mockup to be tidy so that any orchestrator who's going to transcribe your work for a real session don't get migraines.

To further elaborate on your question, these are two very useful assets when dealing with samples:

1. Mastering the concept of realistic mockups; as you may already know, this is quite important when you want to mimick the final product as closely as possible. This ensures that everyone knows what to expect beforehand, and thus you need intimate knowledge of not only how the orchestra behaves, but how to make your samples sound like one. Very messy stuff unless you're writing modern or hybrid cinematic orchestral music where not much is going on.

2. Creative use of samples; this is where you would normally do things that are impossible or weird in a realistic context but artistically they are valuable. I remember writing a track where I had the debut Horns section play rather softly (p-mp) but with mic adjustments and simply some gain on top, made it sound much louder resulting in a loud mellow sound, which is also paradoxical because you can't play soft and loud at the same time. But that was the sound I was looking for, and I didn't want to do it with the Tuba due to range issues, so you get the idea. Experimentation. Then you have the writing style where you treat the orchestra as a synthesizer, and thus you ignore the rules.

Cheers


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## purple (Jun 26, 2020)

I suspect that someone asking a question like this probably has bigger fish to fry in terms of music theory studies if that's the path you want to go down.

It's worth learning divisi especially if you ever want to work with a live orchestra, but it's not really something that sticks out on its own as a technique. If you learn more about how to write parts and voice chords, divisi will just naturally become part of how you write. I never had to take a class on "divisi" in music school. I learned how to write out chord progressions and through my knowledge of instrument ranges, techniques, and how they are often used by the composers I admire, it just comes naturally. If you listen to more orchestral music, whether it's mozart, or jeremy soule, or john williams, or schoenberg, these sorts of things will just feel instinctual.

Play your music on two hands piano. Do you need more than 5 fingers to play the music? OK, then you probably need divisi if it's only going to be a limited group of instruments (like a string section)


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## JohnG (Jun 26, 2020)

hmm-- a bit of unnecessary scolding in some cases.

to the OP: Given your goals, write whatever sounds good to you. There is a cue on a film score I did with full orchestra that has six French Horns on the melody -- overdubbed 2x extra, so it's really 18 horns. Of course it's lunacy and probably would have sounded pretty good with just the six. This was a live score, but the principle is the same -- whatever sounds good, _especially_ if you don't have an orchestra.

Berlioz was always calling for bonkers numbers of players, including (if I remember accurately) four separate orchestras in four corners of a giant hall to perform one piece. Not sure that ever happened, but still.

Conclusion?

Enjoy yourself and keep learning. If you want to see how it's done, learn to read enough notation so you can look at scores by Ravel and Debussy and maybe some of the 19th century big guns "Pines of Rome" or Richard Strauss. And of course, John Williams, whose orchestral scores are available and who is the greatest living orchestrator. Ok maybe James Newton Howard and John Powell too. Probably others.

Just don't forget to play and have fun with it.

Kind regards,

John


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## Gene Pool (Jun 26, 2020)

JohnG said:


> hmm-- a bit of unnecessary scolding in some cases.



Kind of ironic that the first instance of actual scolding in this thread is the one pointing the finger at others for their non-existent "unnecessary scolding."

Everyone was having fun till you showed up.


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## robgb (Jun 26, 2020)

JJP said:


> The same can be said for writing prose or poetry. You can put whatever you want on the page however you like it. There are no rules.
> 
> If you want it to make sense or sound reasonably coherent, there are some specific rules of which you must, at the very least, be aware.


Like what? I don't know any and I get along okay.


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## NoamL (Jun 26, 2020)

Ex-cello guy here 

Divisi is essential & used extensively by all the great composers. Maybe to go back to square one, *why do composers use divisi at all?*

1. To control the number of players
2. To control the balance and thickness of musical texture / number of musical lines
3. To assign an instrument to different registers (and musical roles) at the same time.

Controlling the number of players on a musical line is the same as controlling musical weight. It's like the difference between a ballpoint pen and a sharpie. Both will get the message across - there's not much of a _volume_ difference really - but do you want a bold, thick sound or a chamber-strings sound? Or even a soloist sound? The variety of sound-weights is one of the resources that is special to strings, so use it! BTW dividing the strings is not the only way to control player count. You can simply say "first 2 desks" for instance: the first 4 players will perform and the rest will be silent.

To study this, I highly recommend Stravinsky's complete score to _Firebird. _Study the strings only and check out how he is constantly controlling how many players are on each line. Also _Rite Of Spring_ (especially in the 2nd half of the ballet) has some interesting chamber strings textures where he puts some musical lines on small chamber groups of strings and even at one point on a group of cello solos!





Also highly recommend studying any JW score, especially this cue for string orchestra -



This cue helps explain the "balance and depth of textures" idea. Here JW is trying to write a lament and he is exploring the full register of the strings. So at times he has a simple 4 or 5 voice orchestration, at other times he puts V1 up high and divides V2 and VA into four voices below them to fill out the harmony. At other times he wants a dark and brooding texture so he divides the cellos and basses to fill up the bass staff. The variety of textures complements the variety of harmonies so that he is able to get 6 minutes of very emotionally varied & developing music out of a simple melody.






In short. When synthestrating I always try to pick the right tool for the job. Usually among these different tools:


*Violin I**Violin II**Violas**Celli**Basses*Library161412108Spitfire Symphonic Strings161410107Hollywood Strings128776Cinematic Strings 2107765Cinematic Studio Strings65440Afflatus Strings (Divisi)43333Spitfire Chamber Strings11110Cinematic Studio Solo Strings


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## purple (Jun 26, 2020)

NoamL said:


> Ex-cello guy here
> 
> Divisi is essential & used extensively by all the great composers. Maybe to go back to square one of theory, *why do composers use divisi at all?*
> 
> ...



I wish there were a cinematic studio _studio_ strings


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## JJP (Jun 26, 2020)

robgb said:


> Like what? I don't know any and I get along okay.



Regrdn rulez n stff. I dn no. Mabee lik spllin n grammer n stff. Git gud cz uthrwz ustart tosnd stpid in kconacs itacknama svwp.


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## robgb (Jun 26, 2020)

JJP said:


> Regrdn rulez n stff. I dn no. Mabee lik spllin n grammer n stff. Git gud cz uthrwz ustart tosnd stpid in kconacs itacknama svwp.


Bad analogy. You can still tell a helluva good story into a tape machine and have someone else transcribe it for you. A lot of authors work that way.


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## robgb (Jun 26, 2020)

Gene Pool said:


> That's fun to say on the internet, but in the big boy world when you're writing for musicians, for certain venues, for genres, for clients, etc., there are plenty of rules.


Well, I've been a professional screenwriter and novelist, working in the big boy world, for over thirty years, and I've heard other writers talk about "writerly" rules and it's all basically bullshit. You do what works for YOU. You discard what doesn't. There are certain baseline things you should probably know, but let's call them guidelines, because those are easier to break if you're so inclined.

It's no different in music, which I've been doing even longer. Anyway, there's no real point in arguing about this. We all have different opinions, and we all approach creativity in different ways. Nobody is wrong.


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## JJP (Jun 26, 2020)

robgb said:


> Bad analogy. You can still tell a helluva good story into a tape machine and have someone else transcribe it for you. A lot of authors work that way.



Yeah, yeah, you can also hum or whistle parts into a recorder and have somebody do a lot of work to transcribe and arrange it; but that doesn't help the OP who is asking specific questions.

I know you've been a writer and I also know that you understand the basics of sentence structure, spelling, and grammar because you can type these responses. Those are the basic rules for language. Musicians need to know similar basic rules unless they want to rely on armies of people to help them do their work. You can also hire someone to ghost write for you, as is done in the book world. That can all be done, but it's too expensive for most composing projects, and it doesn't help the OP to learn anything about the legitimate questions being asked.

"Excuse me experienced person, how is this done?"
"I don't know. Nobody told me. You don't need to know either because there are no rules."

That's useless and trollish.

Be nice. Be helpful. That's the reason this forum is supposed to exist.

@HarmonyCore There have been some excellent, breathtakingly detailed responses in this thread. (Thank you to Covid for people having time to respond?) Heed that advice and you'll be on the right track.


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## Gene Pool (Jun 26, 2020)

robgb said:


> Well, I've been a professional screenwriter and novelist, working in the big boy world, for over thirty years, and I've heard other writers talk about "writerly" rules and it's all basically bullshit.



Doesn't make other things bullshit. Music is a quite distinctive animal, apart from everything else, and dramatic writing is not comparable to it. The scriptwriting timing rule, as you probably know, is that about one page of script represents about one minute of screen time, _on average_. And everything unfolds linearly. One minute of mostly double-spaced text from a single page; must be nice.

Whereas with music, a score unfolds linearly, vertically, and diagonally; it can have hundreds of dots, lines, symbols, hieroglyphics, instructions, and other very detailed fun stuff; it all has to be written and presented correctly according to the appropriate standard; it has to be playable by up to about 100 musicians on at least that many instruments; it has to work within the acoustics and layout of that venue; it has to quickly balance; and one page of _all that_ can blow by in as little as 6 seconds sometimes.



robgb said:


> You do what works for YOU.



For very limited, very narrow purposes, you can get by with that. But elsewhere, sorry, no.

And if you have to hire other people who know what they're doing to fix things for you (and not simply because the deadline makes it impossible for you to do a solo flight), then the result doesn't really come down to you having done "what works for you," since the Captain-of-my-own-ship routine doesn't translate all by itself to—again—real musicians playing real instruments in a specific style or genre for a particular purpose in a certain venue for a nervous client.

When some of the best players on the planet have a train collision, no one is going to tolerate:

_"Well, I just did what I want. I write from the heart, not the head. Don't you understand how creative I am? The dignity of my vision is above your earthly concerns of practicality, playability, balance, and effectiveness. So just play it and stop your bitchin', dammit, cuz it's what works best for me."_



robgb said:


> Nobody is wrong.



Wanna bet?


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## NoamL (Jun 26, 2020)

robgb said:


> Bad analogy. You can still tell a helluva good story into a tape machine and have someone else transcribe it for you. A lot of authors work that way.



There is lots of good music that was clearly written "for strings" and someone later orchestrated it out, whether the composer or someone else - if that is what your analogy means...

It is hard to go wrong writing for "the strings" because we are a homogeneous group, we sit close together, and we are used to balancing things out as a string orchestra based on the musicianship we develop playing in quartets and such.

That doesn't mean that treating the strings as a big synth is the right approach though. As a composer and player, I can tell when a composer is thinking about the strings as 5 individual string sections which each have 4 unique sounding strings. Elgar imo is one of the greatest string composers of all time as he uses all of the sections creatively and generously. Any piece of his will provide good study for composers who play other instruments.


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## CT (Jun 26, 2020)

Stephen Limbaugh said:


>



My next five pieces just wrote themselves, thanks!

Anyway, I don't know what the hell this thread is about, but divided strings are so bleedin' common, and it's one of those things I wish developers would divert their attention to, away from the esoteric stuff that shows up exceedingly rarely in standard orchestral writing. I just recently looked through a ton of scores paying close attention to how the strings are utilized. The in-vogue articulations are astonishingly incidental in their use. Meanwhile, there's an embarrassment of elementary material that simply can't be tackled with samples.

Of course, newer sounds shouldn't be limited in their use because they aren't common in the bulk of traditional orchestral writing. But when it comes to virtual instruments, I think we need more focused offerings. That more contemporary coloristic stuff can be its own beast, but stop leaving the damn staples out of the core libraries!

LASS, as it turns out, is still one of the most well-balanced in this regard. CSS as well, though as Troels will tell you, muted strings deserve to be real, and not limited to longs. Those mutes get put on a lot.


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## Dave Connor (Jun 26, 2020)

Divisi is the same as everything else under the musical sun: it has a sound. I wouldn’t understand a complete dismissal of it out of hand since it is a great (and even necessary) sound throughout the literature. In certain genre’s (trailer music?) it may in fact not work as far as weight and style - which is a modern phenomenon - but it couldn’t be more common in centuries of orchestral music. To ignore divisi is essentially ignoring string writing itself.


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## Marlon Brown (Jun 26, 2020)

John Williams wrote divisi string parts all the time and they made the music magical!


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## HarmonyCore (Jun 27, 2020)

Oh boy !! I have to read all these responses 
Sorry I was sleeping


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## HarmonyCore (Jun 27, 2020)

Thanks everyone for taking the time to respond, much appreciated.

Ok, I will make it more simple. My goal is to make music in the same genre as 2SFH or "epic" hybrid orchestra, not classical AT ALL. I understand some responses but I couldn't understand some others. I am not going to make any John Williams-style music as they are very classical despite that I LOVE all his scores but it's extremely hard to arrange Superman theme in a DAW. I tried, very freaking hard. 

I listen to many 2SFH tracks and that's it !! this is the style that I want to produce because it is easier to arrange and orchestrate in a DAW. I didn't mean easier as a piece of cake, I meant easier as doable but not impossible. Superman and Jurrasic Park was impossible for me (someone else can do it but not me) inside the Cubase. Yes, sample libraries became more mature and have many artics. but still can't mimic a real orchestra as some members pointed out. 

I am all about making a Brave and Courageous loud music like 2SFH, Period.


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## JohnG (Jun 27, 2020)

HarmonyCore said:


> Brave and Courageous loud music like 2SFH, Period.



Excellent! Knowing what you want is a good start.

If you want that epic approach, listen carefully to what they do (try headphones) but bear in mind that it does help to know a little bit here and there about music that some might call "classical."

Can you read a score or not? If not, then it will take longer to figure it all out.

Do you know chord progressions and what they are? One way to learn is to copy a piece you like and try to get as close as possible. Don't be afraid to double with electric guitars or synths or anything -- no restrictions.


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## HarmonyCore (Jun 27, 2020)

JohnG said:


> Excellent! Knowing what you want is a good start.
> 
> If you want that epic approach, listen carefully to what they do (try headphones) but bear in mind that it does help to know a little bit here and there about music that some might call "classical."
> 
> ...



Yes John, I know the basic to intermediate theory that any non-classically-trained musician know. Intervals, chords, chord prog., scales, modes, voice leading, and harmony. I've been playing guitar in a band since high school so I know these stuff a long time ago except voice leading and harmony, I started to learn these when I purchased my piano 6 yrs ago. I started to learn and read score last month but of course very slow. Sight reading is not my goal as I am not planning to read in real time like in orchestra. I just want to interpret any score. I always use my headphone monitors when listening to any track.

And finally, the "Impossible" track by 2SFH drives me crazy and I am ready to sell my car to learn how to compose like that


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## JohnG (Jun 27, 2020)

HarmonyCore said:


> And finally, the "Impossible" track by 2SFH drives me crazy and I am ready to sell my car to learn how to compose like that



Super -- you have all the tools to write something great. If I were your mentor, I would suggest you write down the chord progression from "Impossible" and then try to mimic it as closely as possible -- musically, not the 'sound' at first. Getting the sound is actually another entire thing.

Even if you confine the exercise to your favourite four or eight bars, it's absolutely amazing what you can teach yourself.

If you want to go down the score route, I'm sure you can get suggestions. Those 19th century guys knew how to make a chord sound 'real big' and there again, four bars of analysis can really help, especially for use of choir and brass, but really for all of it.

In other words, you don't have to do any score study, but a little bit can really help a lot. You don't have to boil the ocean either -- just grab / steal some techniques and use them right away. "Just in time" learning.

Most of all, have fun! That's why we do this instead of working for Wells Fargo! (or similar...)


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## HarmonyCore (Jun 27, 2020)

JohnG said:


> Super -- you have all the tools to write something great. If I were your mentor, I would suggest you write down the chord progression from "Impossible" and then try to mimic it as closely as possible -- musically, not the 'sound' at first. Getting the sound is actually another entire thing.
> 
> Even if you confine the exercise to your favourite four or eight bars, it's absolutely amazing what you can teach yourself.
> 
> ...



Thank you, Thank you, John 
Yeah, that's what I do in a daily basis so Well Fargo doesn't apply to me here ... haha


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## bryla (Jun 27, 2020)

While you've had great responses and suggestions for study I have been thinking about your original question. It all however comes down to actually studying the people that have orchestrated and used divided sections for acoustic concert halls though.

Recently I have been orchestrating for a Japanese anime composer who would be considered to write 'epic' music. I don't know 2SFH or how it relates though but my experience with his music echoes my peripheral understanding of the composing style.

He has written lots of divisi parts for strings especially in that 'motor' driven type of spiccato patterns that is all too familiar with that genre. The problem with the use of divisi for this type is that most of the occurrences is not complimentary to the music.

There is a general rule I was taught that people can discern 3 (or was it 4) roles in music. Melody, harmony and rhythm – the 4th might be a countermelody. So when he had written melody for violins, rhythm for the percussion section, harmony for trombones, countermelody for either trumpet or horns, two separate bass patterns for cello/bass and tuba/electric bass the only thing he needed was that 16th note pattern. He wanted it as that typical semi-arpeggiation of a chord and the only ones not doing anything were the violas. So now all they had to do was to complete a role that 1) didn't fit the others 2) couldn't be heard but 3) were 2 or 3-way divisi.

Where I could I would have to solve much of this without getting noticed though.

Now you could look at a score and say 'Wow, he used divisi there, let me try to figure out what he's doing' and maybe think that looked cool and all when you heard the music you would never notice the part anyway. The key here is to understand the roles each element plays and why divisi actually is used. Don't use it simply because your library has the option or to get yet another thing going.


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## HarmonyCore (Jun 27, 2020)

bryla said:


> Now you could look at a score and say 'Wow, he used divisi there, let me try to figure out what he's doing' and maybe think that looked cool and all when you heard the music you would never notice the part anyway. The key here is to understand the roles each element plays and why divisi actually is used. Don't use it simply because your library has the option or to get yet another thing going.



I understand that, thanks 

Psychologically, I was very curious to know how Divisi works because I feel really bad to leave elements in orchestration without experimenting it. And because I took the responsibility of orchestration when I decided to produce epic music for a living in my home studio, I find Divisi is an important part of orchestration. I am not holding a degree in music and I understand that orchestration is way bigger than me. I am trying my best to learn it as much as I can. I think my problem boils down to when using a Divisi, not how Divisi works because even if I know how it works and may not know when to use it.

As a normal listener, I find 2SFH's tracks use very modern orchestration that I can understand. They don't follow the traditional orchestration of John Williams and old symphonies. However, there are hidden voices and textures in their music that makes it thick and rich, And that I still don't know anything about.


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## bryla (Jun 27, 2020)

I think you can find all the techniques they use in pieces like Barber's Adagio for Strings, Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings and the Adagietto from Mahler's 5th symphony. They are not at all dusty and old.


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