Notes 2
NOTES ABOUT THE TADPOLE THINGS
You did them in one go. You are working with a snippet of melody which you then develop in as many ways as you can think of. They take about 2 hours each. You didn't leave them until at least the melody was recorded.
Because the lead is limited to one Xiosynth voice you are focussing on the melody structure first, then putting the chords on. There are constructed bits, and loose bits which lead back to constructed bits.
They can be drawn and described roughly with little symbols. You drew the diagrams afterwards.
You played them in one take. (except for I and J). You didn't always accept the first take. They needed to 'go beyond' (I mean I had to feel surprised and pleased). Some sections were left unwritten. Some mistakes are in there but you can't tell. I mean I made small errors which I corrected or reacted to. This gives extra depth.
While preparing you did sometimes record phrases into Peak to refer to (but sometimes you relied on remembering the whole thing without Peak).
You decided that these should not be wild solos. They have space around the phrases so you can hear the delays. They are simple melodies expanding. There is not too much playing with filters (there is a little).
When adding the chords I didn't worry too much whether they were 'correct chords'. I mostly stayed in the same inversion each time a chord appeared. And to repeat as much as possible. And to keep them out of the way and not hold them. The chords surge under the phrases then disappear. Occasionally though the chords vary under a repeated melody phrase (but not often). I began by trying to almost hide the pad chords in the mix.
Sometimes the massive repeating delays dictated where the melody had to stay. Because echoing notes didn't sit over the next bit well. (But I think this was rare).
You used notes next to each other a lot. (I read that in that melody & harmony book).
You did the last 2 in a different way. (i.e multitracking (stopping and starting between phrases)). Not sure why.