Project K-ON, ep. 1
I think somewhere along the line, in my delusional, hyper-hysterical fanboy raeging, I proclaimed that I would transcribe all the OST pieces played in K-ON. ON MY HONNOOORRRRRR, I SHALL DO EET. Of course, with my moderately crappy Noteworthy Composer, notating percussion is excrutiatingly difficult, so I’ll abstain from that suicidal path, if you don’t mind.
#1 00:47-1:54
There’s a drum interlude in this one that I didn’t bother to do, but other than that the form remains as is. It’s an interesting “intro” song, a really loud first theme, and the second theme is reused throughout this episode.
#2 3:36-4:49
Ok the beginning of this one was really damn hard to hear over the Join My Club Zergling Rush. The drums is just a basic swing pattern (ok, a two-feel but yeah…) that I could insert from previous transcriptions, and it’s pretty jazzy. It gets into an Autumn Leaves progression and uses an interesting major7ths in diminished thirds to open and close the piece.
#3 5:27-7:01
Kind of a slow, bumbling, country song (at least the “galloping” ostinato line). This is a shortened version – in the anime it repeats the entire section before you get to the coda, which is pretty noticeable.
#4 7:35-7:56
This one is ok, a fine comic piece. It’s cut short to go into Ritsu’s pseudo-flashback scene.
#5 8:08-8:34
Like most sad pieces, the chord voicing follows a simple and predictable pattern. I like the accordion though!
#6 9:05-10:43
This one was a royal pain to transcribe, reallly hard to hear the rhodes in the background sometimes. IMO this one is a bit too jazzy. It has several quick modulations that you’d only hear in bop tunes and it’s too complex for this type of 4-koma anime. It also has that signature jazz end…I forget if it’s Count Basie’s end, or the rhythm change end, but you’ve surely heard it before.
I also left out a section (it just repeats the first theme and adds in a vamp with some minor sevenths a whole step apart, then takes the D.S. al coda).
#7 11:28-11:39
I wonder if this even counts? Random castanets song…
#8 11:58-12:24
This one’s just an arrangement of #1, starting with the second theme.
#9 13:06-14:21
not even gonna bother with this one… @_@
#10 14:33-16:33
Too much percussion I couldn’t handle in this one, but otherwise, this one is nice. I especially like the pizzicato strings. They’re kind of bubbly, so it goes well with the overall mood of the anime.
#11 17:24-18:23
another arrangement of #1
#12 19:15-19:58
well this is that insert song, they one they actually perform.
#13 20:33-22:17
I really like this one, it fits quite well over the last bit of the episode. I think it’s definitely due to the I-V vamp, and it sounds a lot like a road song, but you’re just getting in the car, so maybe it’s a Beginning of a Trip song? It’s definitive, to close out the episode, but signifies that things are just getting started.
Overall
Well, after spending those hours transcribing all those pieces, Hyakkoku really likes (1) rhodes, (2) that one specific pattern in the bass, (3) marimba. Marimba actually fits really well here, especially if you’re using soft mallets (hard mallets always suck). While all of these are nice tunes, I’m not sure if going into the more elaborate B sections (they’re usually much more harmonically/rythmically complex than the themes of each piece) is a smart move. Sometimes it complements the scene very well (like #10 when Mio and Ritsu and interrogating Yui about her favorite guitarist), but othertimes the whole song sounds a bit odd, like #2, which is way too jazzy IMO.
April 6th, 2009 at 9:02 am
Holy cow, you’re insane. Color me impressed! Are you going to keep this up?
April 6th, 2009 at 9:11 am
>>Holy cow, you’re insane. Color me impressed! Are you going to keep this up?
I dunno, I could easily do one tune a day, but 3+, when a lot of them are rather hard, that’s a lot. Then again, I didn’t have to rush =3. I’m just really interested in the music for next episode now lol, to see how many rearrangements ‘n such there’ll be.
April 6th, 2009 at 9:27 am
My ears ejaculated.
April 6th, 2009 at 9:30 am
Now that I hear it again, #10 reminds me of http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkA17QI1gSM
April 6th, 2009 at 10:11 am
Episodic blogging: now with a musical twist! (I might do this for Valkyria, mostly because I already have the OST and so, already have an idea for what pieces will be used.)
April 6th, 2009 at 10:11 am
Solid. I’m wondering where you get the time to do this.
April 6th, 2009 at 10:27 am
#7 sounds Persian. Also, good job-u, I think it’s nice practice for the ears. Other people translate song lyrics, etc, and it’s a similar concept.
April 6th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
[...] before I forget, lelangir’s attempting to transcribe all of the K-ON soundtrack he hears during the show. I think [...]
April 6th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Finally going through the listings.
Track#1: Pretty feisty and has a lot of good energy to it. I like.
Track#2: I think your sample may have gotten screwy in transit somehow. Parts of it sound really off tune. Could just be me though, so a confirm would be nice.
Will probably go down the list further as the day goes along.
April 6th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
Impressive work here… And you seem to really know your stuff actually, which is always nice to see. Seeing this makes me want to go back to transcribing or even some composition… ah well, good luck to ya!
April 6th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
I actually kinda like the jazzy pieces, though maybe that’s because of your handling of them. I’m worried I’m going to like these more than the original pieces. :P
April 6th, 2009 at 6:21 pm
this is really cool though…
April 6th, 2009 at 8:22 pm
awesome. kudos and good luck! (or do those mean the same thing? I’m not sure).
April 7th, 2009 at 9:16 am
[...] [←122] Kaioshin: Is it because Saki gets right into the whole Mahjong affair while K-On lingers until the very end of the episode? I’m not quite sure what it is specifically, but it’s probably a combination of the above and the fact that I find the Mahjong fair presented to me in Saki’s opener fair more sophisticated and to my tastes…then K-Ons light music which barely got approached in the first episode. [...]
April 13th, 2009 at 11:35 am
At first episodics were all about summary and a bit of opinion, but it looks like we’ll be seeing some editorial and musical episodics as well. I like it!