Hey David!
"It sounded like the more-or-less standard FL Studio strings to me."
But how would you define standard FL Studio strings? A preset from one of the stock synths? Or, a preset from one of the stock effects?
One of the interesting paradoxes of minimal music is that it sounds very simple, but there's usually much more to it than meets the eye. I would dare anyone to re-create Healing Fountain using "standard FL Studio strings". And I really mean it - try it! You can even download the demo version of FL and run it through WINE.
If I were asked to try to reproduce it, I would probably take whatever strings or pads I could find that sound similar and put a phaser on them. But it's the details that matter. The transparency of the texture, the many subtle movements. And this is where, I think, this track shines.
Having said that, I also don't want to oversell the originality or quality of my work 😂
So, here's how I approached this track.
I am using two synths. Each plays a chord: one plays C#-D#-G#, another plays A#-F#-A#. Collectively, they are reproducing a full pentatonic scale, a time-honored method to not worry about chord compatibility. I pan them to different channels and then use EQs for each, but not to clean anything up, but to actually shape the sound - I cut out some frequencies completely. At this point I am not yet creating a track per se, but sculpting what would become source material.
I then apply a bit of reverb to both synths to blur the details slightly.
Now, you would think that I am using a phaser here, but I'm actually not! Instead, I take one of the EQ bands, raise it and then automate it: this gives me total control over the glissando effect, which is, thus, fully derived from just the played chords - I am sort of stroking its vibrating strings by moving through the spectrum and gently picking out note after note. It's not impossible to get that effect with a phaser, but you'll have much less control and you'll have the phaser do other things to the sound. And here, I am just focusing on the notes and getting this really clean "singing".
Okay, the source is ready. I render the result to a flac file.
After this I open it in another project. I then play the render at note C5 and note C4, apply reverb to glue the whole thing together, some broad strokes EQing, to mostly clean up the mid sections, and then apply a subtle filter and automate it throughout the track. And only at this point the track takes shape and actually begins to sound like simple strings with a phaser applied. I then also add a stream recording and create a bunch of sounds that pop up from time to time in the track.
Was it done the hard way? I would argue - no! I think that this process allowed me to create a texture that is deceptively simple, but would be very difficult to reproduce with just some strings and a phaser.
And with electronic music, the sound you end up with matters. It's as much sculpting, as it is composing.
"Do you repeatedly listen through each and tweak as you make one?"
Most dronings were made in a similar way that cooking is done: you put things in boiling water and see what happens. Brian Eno used a metaphor of gardening: you put seeds in the ground and see what comes out.
I would have things run, while I play around with the effects and try to create interesting movement. Usually the process would involve three stages: preparing some sort of source material, then loading it up into Kluppe (or a separate project in FL Studio) and having multiple copies of it play at different speeds, while passing the result through a bunch of effects, and then third stage is finalizing the mix, adding more details or even running another looping session with different sounds.
In case of droning142, the reason why it's so long is that it uses phasing: there are two copies of a sequence that play against each other, but are at different lengths. One can argue that this is actually not phasing, but a form of polymeter, but both terms are usually applied to notes, whereas I am simply going through audio recordings of a sequence, so the difference doesn't really matter.
And so I think I made a rough calculation of how long should the track be to exhaust all the permutations of the sequences. I am actually not sure that it did exhaust them, but I gave it enough time to explore through the permutations. Because the sequence changes frequently - and each time it's a slightly new rhythm.
I don't remember exactly, but I am quite sure that I first recorded the sequences and then separately went through the same process with the strings/pads. I played them manually into Kluppe and then phased against each other, sending them through Rakarrack.
L.V.
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