When you talk about minimal music, you are surely talking about a genre but, more that anything else, you are also talking about a series of techniques to be applied to any kind of track you want to produce. These techniques are really simple to understand and they are the key to turn your production into minimalism. Here they are:
- Drone (long notes);
- Ostinato (loops or short repeated melodies);
- Augmentation (playing a melody at a slower speed);
- Diminuition (playing a melody at a faster speed);
- Note subtraction (take one note away at a time from your melody);
- Note addition (add one note at a time to your melody);
- Metamorphosis (change one note per repeat);
- Static harmony (change one note per loop to reach a new chord);
- Rhythmic displacement (change the accent of each next note as it repeats);
- Phasing (creating longer loops of the same melody by extending the last note and repeat it until they sync again).
This piece of music is a clear example of all of these, and with also its only four instrument tracks it can be definitely defined as a minimal work.
All the synthesis is done thanks to Ableton Operator tool and the main theme was created taking as a reference Baba O’Riley by The Who.
For a better experience use anything but laptop or smartphone speakers (it is just a rough mix).
Dam Bitz 