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Orchestral Epic Music Rhytms

I'm talking about those modern orchestral rhythms. It doesn't have to big BIG!
IN GENERAL, I'm bad at this. I can't compose a rhythm section that carries the music around it's shoulder. That makes any string souring listenable. I'm just bad at how to fill rhythms with Orchestral Instruments. I don't know which hits need to hit often and more scarcely. In pop music it's like.. Kick Snare Kick Snare Kick Snare with almost everytime there is a clap and a high hate. I don't know how that works with Orchestral Instruments.

Do you have any advice, tutorial or books on this matter?
 
Hey..
I've been kind of in the same boat recently enough..what I've found is..1..get to know your samples..2..think in terms of high/mid/low..3..record stuff in and concentrate on adjusting the velocities..
That's pretty much it I'd say..there's more to it than kick/snare though..
 
well it's a slightly tricky subject because it's always part of the totality of orchestration. And in fact orchestras didn't really have an obvious groove or rhythm to them ( i'd humbly argue) until Stravinsky's The Rite of spring. The first real piece of orchestral "chugging"....he predated Metallica !

But it's just the same as pop music really. Think of the orchestra like a huge 808 and assign beats where you want . Just bear in mind the sound quality of the instruments and their ability to play the part. Flutes can do 16ths hi hats no problem but tubas perhaps not .

But for realistic orchestral grooves there are good examples. Respighi, Stravinsky,Prokoviev. For instance

the rhythm is mostly strings and brass hits.

Stravinsky is all 8th notes



Perhaps the ultimate homage to rhythm in an orchestral session :




"My Most Successful piece....a pity there's no music in it !"


best

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You could try listening to ballets and other dances, which tend to have a very clear rhythmic presentation for obvious reasons:



Note that the rhythm is maintained here by bells -- i.e., an instrument with a pretty sharp attack. Horns, pizzicato strings, and piano would do the same kind of work. But staccato strings can also maintain a "BUP-bup-bup, BUP-bup-bup":



But the basics are the same as in pop, I think -- choose a time signature; accent some beats and make others less strong.

EDIT:Just realized you started with the word "modern," and we're giving you classical answers. But I think with modern film music, at least, it's even easier, because there's a lot more percussion. E.g., there's this, where there are drums, very fast strings pulses, and then brass hits on the accents:

 
I'm sorry for bumping this. I'm still having troubles composing these. I think I lack the theoretical skills of doing this... As in, let's talk about a rock band and producing it in the box with drum a VST.
For doing this it's critical to know what type of drums (snare, kick, hi-hat) you can hit simultaneously (a realistic approach) - a realistic approach sounding natural case.
Maybe I should work on this approach?
 
My observation about 'Epic' music produced from sample libraries....

.... the whole "genre" evolved due to the limitations of the libraries (they really dictate what will work)

Henceforth, lots of repeated notes, low cello marcatos, etc. etc.

Not too much nuance....unless you really spend a lot of time (...ie: LOTS of time) trying to make fake strings sound like they can have nuance.
 
I like to break percussion up into groups. Big (taiko, bass drum, timpani, surdo, gran casa, etc.), medium (snare, toms, octabons, etc.), small (bongos, pellet drum, etc), wood (stick clicks, whip crack, rims, etc.), metals (anvils, cymbals, etc.).

I think what makes a full drum beat work in the first place is that it fills most of the frequency spectrum. You take kick, snare, and hi hat, and you have your low, mid, and high frequencies filled out rather nicely. To get a full sound with orchestral and hybrid percussion, I try to apply a similar concept in my music. So maybe I'll have taikos, toms, and some anvils or various other metal crap going on at the same time.

As for the rhythms themselves, these do tend to be somewhat different in that a lot of orchestral music doesn't necessarily have a backbeat in the sense that a pop track would have (although there's even exceptions to this). So, usually the snare occupies the backbeat role on beats 2 and 4 in pop music vs in a lot of orchestral music, it's doing something else. One of the most common doublings with snare I find is rhythmically doubling up the brass parts. Trumpet/snare is a super common double. Here's an example:

Otherwise, experiment. Steal. Can't copyright a rhythm. Ostinatos are your friend for epic sounding stuff. A lot of times, less is more. Layering multiple ostinatos on top of each other can be fun and yield good results too. Hope this helps. Thank you for coming to my TED talk :).
 
I like to break percussion up into groups. Big (taiko, bass drum, timpani, surdo, gran casa, etc.), medium (snare, toms, octabons, etc.), small (bongos, pellet drum, etc), wood (stick clicks, whip crack, rims, etc.), metals (anvils, cymbals, etc.).

I think what makes a full drum beat work in the first place is that it fills most of the frequency spectrum. You take kick, snare, and hi hat, and you have your low, mid, and high frequencies filled out rather nicely. To get a full sound with orchestral and hybrid percussion, I try to apply a similar concept in my music. So maybe I'll have taikos, toms, and some anvils or various other metal crap going on at the same time.

As for the rhythms themselves, these do tend to be somewhat different in that a lot of orchestral music doesn't necessarily have a backbeat in the sense that a pop track would have (although there's even exceptions to this). So, usually the snare occupies the backbeat role on beats 2 and 4 in pop music vs in a lot of orchestral music, it's doing something else. One of the most common doublings with snare I find is rhythmically doubling up the brass parts. Trumpet/snare is a super common double. Here's an example:

Otherwise, experiment. Steal. Can't copyright a rhythm. Ostinatos are your friend for epic sounding stuff. A lot of times, less is more. Layering multiple ostinatos on top of each other can be fun and yield good results too. Hope this helps. Thank you for coming to my TED talk :).

This helped a bit thank you. I'll try to work with it.
 
This helped a bit thank you. I'll try to work with it.

No sweat! Thanks for listening to me spout off at the mouth. I'm a drummer, so percussion gets me going, haha.

There's tons of stuff out there. Orchestration books have some good examples, but they're usually geared towards stuff that's almost 100 years old at this point. There's stuff to be learned there, but a lot of modern hybrid-orchestra writing feels half based in orchestral tradition and half in modern pop. I think blurring that line is probably going to get you closer to the result that you're looking for. Good luck!
 
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