New Track - The Alternatives (for Sonic Underworld Atrea)

Merry Christmas and a very happy new year to all of you, my valued readers!


To end off this year, my last track of 2019 is entitled The Alternatives. This is a demo for Sonic Underworld's new sound-set "Atrea" for Uhe Repro 5.

The sounds in this track are solely from the Atrea sound-set and I find them to be very useable. Unlike many of their previous sound-sets, a cursory glance across the sounds category will reveal that the familiar percussion section does not exist in Atrea this time round. Upon auditioning the sounds, I found that there are many sounds that can be used in a percussive role in a composition to fill up that "gap". It serves to remind me that labels and classifications are really just names we give to things in order for us to make sense of the world and things around us.

The track is going in the direction of a cinematic, movie soundtrack, something that can be used alongside a visual narrative in film or TV.

There's something different in the style of this piece. Personally, I feel that it is the instrumentation on the mid-high ranges in the track.

I hope you enjoy it!

New Track: Mind Meld

Here's a new demo track I wrote for a new Kontakt library named Meld.

The library has quite a lot of pad sounds, so I played it slow, give it space for the pads to evolve. At this time I was longing to use some orchestral sounds in my work, so I had some of that at a later part of the track to drive the intensity of the mood to a high point at the end.

Here is the Core MeldDown version.
This Core MeldDown version of Mind Melding has just the Meld instruments and light percussion, without the orchestral instruments from the fully arranged version. This arrangement is re-mixed-down and re-mastered.

I will post a link to Meld when I have more information.

My New Track: Orbital (for Sonic Underworld Solaria)

Here's a new track I wrote for Sonic Underworld's Solaria sound set for u-he's Dark Zebra.
This was a lot of fun for me

Musically, the track is simple. From the sounds, I want to express the serenity and beauty of endless space. I was never fluent composing and working with electronic sounds and instruments. This was partly due to the fact that prior to auditioning the sounds from the set, I can't imagine how the end composition will sound like. Not being able to visualise the final sound is like working blind.

Thus, I tried to keep the premise simple and to express more through the naturally evolving sounds from the sound set, to let the patches sing. I listened closely to each patch noticing the kinds of feelings they evoke. Then I think about how to use them effectively, playing to their strengths.

At the end of the piece, I felt like I achieved a new sound that isn't originally in my commonly used musical "vocabulary" if that makes any sense at all. :)

Please leave a comment if you like it, and I hope you do!

Hear this track and others in the Sonic Underworld Solaria playlist: www.soundcloud.com/sonicunderworld/sets/dark-zebra-solaria

NewTrack - Grow

My latest instrumental track features a piano in an orchestral setting. Giving the music a swaying movement of the waltzing 3/4 beat, I hope to bring out swelling and ebbing emotions of warmth, gentleness and love, as well as that of bitter-sweet heartbreaks. These are all part of growing, as we strive to be versions of ourselves.

I hope you enjoy it! Leave a comment if you do.

Lunar (Chinese) New Year

Happy Lunar New Year to one and all. The new year in the lunar calendar is celebrated in many Chinese / Asian traditions.

This celebratory track is done for a greeting video for the church where I attend. Robin the staff laid the percussive and melodic track with a synth patch. I fleshed out the rest of the arrangement.

I hope you enjoy it!

New Track - Skyward!

My newest track is entitled Skyward!

This is a demo track created for Sonic Underworld's Nyah soundset for the Uhe's Zebra synth.

For this track, I tried to evoke an uplifting and dare I say, euphoric feeling of breaking through at the end.

Instruments and mixing wise, I included orchestral elements like brass, light strings and voices. With the exception of the final swell, I try to keep these non-synth elements at the back, so the synth sounds can shine through.


In the Nyah playlist, there is an additional "naked" version that contains only the Nyah patches. You can find it at the second last entry of the following playlist.


When I start writing a new piece of music, I usually start clueless what I was going to write. Usually the first one or two ideas would not be usable. By 30% into the track, I would usually get a good feel of whether the idea is worth developing to the end.

For Skyward, it was different. After coming up with an opening section, the direction of the song just continued to write itself in my mind.

It was not all uphill, unfortunately. At about half-way through the song (around 1 minute 30 seconds), I hit a block and did not know how to proceed. How do I start to resolve and bring the music to an end. As I continued to build up and bring the tension along, the mood of the piece seemed to get darker and darker, and my hope of ending it in a strong and positive light became further and further from my grasp. At that point I was even wondering if I should start with another idea. This part of the production took the longest.

After I managed to resolve it, the rest of the song became almost automatic. I was merely executing the plan that would resolve the idea to the end, and the efficiency spiked at that point.