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An American in Paris

Autor RobertoD

I imported as static pitches the main theme from the MIDI file of Gershwin's An American in Paris.

When converting it in Figures, Synfire totally missed the harmonies. So I deleted the Harmony parameter and re-inserted manually the chords and, especially, some scales.

The right combination chord + scale, the Interpretation parameter set to None and, where necessary, a Weak anchor, gave the correct result without further adjustments.

In particular, to get the correct melody I had to:

  1. put a C chord from meas. 1 to meas. 8 and change the vertical scale to blues4 since a G# is needed toward the end of the phrase. I got the following harmonic context:
  2. F chord in measure 9, beat 1-3, with standard F.ionian scale:
  3. F chord on beat 4 of measure 9, changing the vertical scale to F.aeolian-major since Gershwin wrote an Eb and a Db:
  4. F chord in measure 10 leaving the default F.ionian scale:

It has been necessary to set the anchor on Weak in measure 9, beat 4, to get the Eb-Db notes.

The Interpretation, as said before, was set to None specifically for the Piano part. It can be changed in other parts as necessary, since in Synfire one may set independent parameters for any element.

I would like to conclude that in not-so-rare cases it's not enough to set the correct chord, but will also be necessary to consider carefully which scale will be built on that chord, eventually picking a different one from the drop-down menu.

Hope this helps,
Roberto

an_american_in_paris_1929_64bit_.mp3

Comments

Fr., 24.11.2017 - 01:02 Permalink

As obvious corollary, knowing the musical theory, harmony in particular, is not essential but is strongly recommended ;-)

Fr., 24.11.2017 - 09:50 Permalink

Reference: user manual, p. 182

Set  the  interpretation  to  "Full  Scale"  and  the  strategy  to  "None"  and  disable  "Cooperative".  This  is  the  most  relaxed  confguration.  If  the  desired  tone  still  cannot  be placed,  you  have  an  unsuitable  chord  and/or  vertical  scale.  Find  a  more  suitable scale  or  insert  an  intermediate  chord.