Mars Lasar new age - need help with chords

[MrVegas]

Just listened to a simple but (to me) hauntingly beautiful song by Mars Lasar called Eterna. It is on his album called Eight Minute Meditation Mindscapes. Song was recorded in 2008 with something that sounds like a Rhodes with heavy reverb and chorus, not sure.

 

It's eight minutes long but the chords / notes / voicings are fairly repetitive. The tricky part for me is some of the bass notes are unconventional, which adds to the richness of the piece.

 

If anybody is skilled at picking up songs by ear and has about an hour, I would love to know how to play it at home. If it doesn't sound too weird to say it, I would happily compensate anyone who could nail these notes/chord patterns for me.

[Biggles]

There are Apps like Anytune and Anthem Score that may help you in transcribing the song.

[MrVegas]

Holy crap! Just downloaded Anthem Score and the mp3 of the song and it nailed it! Thank you so much!

 

If anybody could listen to the track a little and give their insight on what kind of patch was used I would be grateful. Now that I have the notes, I could use your all's professional guidance on what kind of gear might have been used to create it. I have a current Kronos and a Yamaha MOXF so I should be able to find something close, but some advice from you guys would be helpful.

 

Cheers.

[timwat]

The overall sound reminds me of Plateaux of Mirror-era Harold Budd. Warm drones and pads, closed subtly-modulated filters underlying the bell-like elements (which may not be bell-heavy Rhodes patch, but a bell-element bathed in ambient FX (reverb and delay). Also, seems to me the quality of your reverb is going to be at least as interesting and significant as the raw patches you use.

 

edit: also, with regard to transcription, a good discipline which helps build my ears is to try to labor through the transcription by hand. A useful tool (especially on a piece like this) is to use a tool that can transpose the pitch but keep the tempo intact (Amazing Slow Downer is one example). If you double the pitch and keep the tempo the same (or even a tad slow), the bass notes will pop right out, allowing you to first nail the bass motion. In this piece, I would imagine picking out the triadic melody elements would then be pretty straightforward. Just a thought for your next project.

[MrVegas]

Thanks for you insights. Again, I'm not a pro, just a hobbyist with limited time, and I really wanted to find a way to bathe certain acoustic piano and bell tones with "ambient FX (reverb and delay)." I dabbled and purchased a semi-expensive Blue Sky reverb pedal. It was strangely complicated to dial in the damn thing to my liking without graduating from Berkley Tech training so I returned it. The onboard effects on the Kronos are a pain in the a$$ to me as well.

 

Also appreciate the tips on learning to transcribe, much appreciated.

[Biggles]

[video:youtube]

 

The Korg Kronos Video Manual series by Korg may help you in getting to know its features.

 

Another great forum is

 

http://www.korgforums.com/forum/phpbb2/index.php?sid=a4087820ca60bccefe09c3af32fe73c7