Can I Please Have Your Opinion?

[MakahaMusic]

PLS LISTEN TO MY SONGS n DO COMMENT IT ( IF U HAV TIME ^^ )

www.soundclick.com/xiahmyungjin

JUST BY VIEWING HELPS A LOT =]

sure thing....

I checked your profile here on soompi, where is your thread??

you should start a thread of your own, so we can leave comments

the other songwriters on soompi have their own threads, like sailorboy62, fantasii, etc....

[MakahaMusic]

here's a new mix of "Another Number", I added a bass line, plus background vocals

I actually sing with a slight southern drawl, believe it or not, and I'm Chinese!!

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...sionINDEX=19246

[Guest fantastikk]

GRAH. I CAN'T STAND THIS. you're so goodd!! T_T i'm so jealous. i listened to a few of your songs (i really like "i'm coming back for your love") and i can imagine some of it playing on the radio. [: your music has a little bit of an old school vibe, but it's so much like easy listening that i can just chillax (yeah, chillax lol) and fall asleep to it. it's not necessarily my taste of music, but it's so good that i'd listen to it anyway. [: your voice is so soothing. i read on some previous page that you think the music is easier to write than the lyrics? i think that's insane, haha. some of my friends think the same thing and i'm just like, "you're insane." i have tons and tons of lyrics and no music to put it to. still, the time that you spend on your lyrics really pays off. i was skimming through some of the lines in "another number" and i really like the chorus.

everything sounds so professional, though. [: i know you said your little home studio is obsolete or something, but that's crazy. keep doing what you're doing. imma start checking back on this thread more often! <3

[Guest mikez]

Hey nice to see you still at it, and still using the same thread too!

I think I commented on one of your ealier songs before, but I just went through some of your new ones again like "Add another number". I cant tell youre chinese, man you are good... though southern sounding music isnt my taste the manager that works near my desk at work plays southern oldies all day, drives me nuts

But good job, keep it up. Are you signed to Independence Music?

[MakahaMusic]

Hey nice to see you still at it, and still using the same thread too!

I think I commented on one of your ealier songs before, but I just went through some of your new ones again like "Add another number". I cant tell youre chinese, man you are good... though southern sounding music isnt my taste the manager that works near my desk at work plays southern oldies all day, drives me nuts

But good job, keep it up. Are you signed to Independence Music?

Thanks for the kind words.

yeah, there aren't too many asians in the country market, I don't know if there are any at all, actually....

What is Independence Music?? Is that a record label?

[Guest fantastikk]

Thanks for the kind words.

yeah, there aren't too many asians in the country market, I don't know if there are any at all, actually....

What is Independence Music?? Is that a record label?

michelle branch! haha i just had to put that out there. [:

[MakahaMusic]

GRAH. I CAN'T STAND THIS. you're so goodd!! T_T i'm so jealous. i listened to a few of your songs (i really like "i'm coming back for your love") and i can imagine some of it playing on the radio. [: your music has a little bit of an old school vibe, but it's so much like easy listening that i can just chillax (yeah, chillax lol) and fall asleep to it. it's not necessarily my taste of music, but it's so good that i'd listen to it anyway. [: your voice is so soothing. i read on some previous page that you think the music is easier to write than the lyrics? i think that's insane, haha. some of my friends think the same thing and i'm just like, "you're insane." i have tons and tons of lyrics and no music to put it to. still, the time that you spend on your lyrics really pays off. i was skimming through some of the lines in "another number" and i really like the chorus.

everything sounds so professional, though. [: i know you said your little home studio is obsolete or something, but that's crazy. keep doing what you're doing. imma start checking back on this thread more often! <3

lol, that's not a good sign =) haha

[MakahaMusic]

This is a new one that I wrote.

this is a Choral Suite, it's about 8 minutes long, it's divided into four movements with each movement about 2 minutes long. People seem to like the third movement the best.

It was done with vocal samples on my Roland synth, it approximates a vocal choir sound, but of course you can still tell it's a keyboard. But it gets the basic idea of the composition across. It's not completely done of course, because I still need to write the text, a Latin text, or I might use a liturgical text, like Mozart, Bach would do. I sang in songsters chorus in my church, and it was one of my greatest musical joys in my life, I love choral music.

Anyways, here's the weblink--

Choral Suite #2:

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...sionINDEX=19246

[Guest geneyoonit]

omg

i ignored this post cuz usually people who sing original songs aren't "that" great.. so i never really paid attention to songs unless i KNOW the song.. (or the artist)

ANYWAY:

u got serious talent in mixing, composing, and singing

great job! and im looking foward to a collab

*edit*

some songs were rEALLY good, others were ehh.. haha alittle too corny for my taste.. but i sang some corny songs so i guess i forgive u

but i REALLY liked ur RnB song!

btw: what do u use for the instrumentals? are they actual instrumentals? or do u hav a midi maker with instruments that u actually connect to a board??

if so, how much did u spend on ur equipment?? im really looking to compose my own songs to put up on soundclick, and to start albums etc, but it sounds way too costly :/

[MakahaMusic]

omg

i ignored this post cuz usually people who sing original songs aren't "that" great.. so i never really paid attention to songs unless i KNOW the song.. (or the artist)

ANYWAY:

u got serious talent in mixing, composing, and singing

great job! and im looking foward to a collab

*edit*

some songs were rEALLY good, others were ehh.. haha alittle too corny for my taste.. but i sang some corny songs so i guess i forgive u

but i REALLY liked ur RnB song!

btw: what do u use for the instrumentals? are they actual instrumentals? or do u hav a midi maker with instruments that u actually connect to a board??

if so, how much did u spend on ur equipment?? im really looking to compose my own songs to put up on soundclick, and to start albums etc, but it sounds way too costly :/

Thank you for the kind words

I'll send you a p.m. about the equipment I use

[MakahaMusic]

here's another one

Recently, I converted some of my songs/compositions recorded on my older Tascam 488 multi-track into Wav files, and this is the first one.

these are pretty esoteric and totally different from the rest, but if you got this far into my thread, then I guess it doesn't matter. I guess you could categorize this as jazz fusion and it's totally non-commercial, I wasn't going for that

Silhouette:

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...sionINDEX=19246

I play guitar, the upright bass player is Gilbert Batangan, and the soprano sax player is Dustin Chang

[MakahaMusic]

I converted another one from cassette to Wav

Horizon:

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...sionINDEX=19246

I'm on guitars, Dustin Chang on tenor saxophone

this is in the same vein as the previous one, and I intentionally disobeyed rules of harmony/progressions in the chorus, but in fusion you can do that

it needs percussion, probably congas, but I ran out of tracks

[MakahaMusic]

this is another one in the same vein as the two above

Currents:

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...sionINDEX=19246

it's me on guitars, and Dustin Chang on soprano saxophone

[MakahaMusic]

here's another jazz fusion piece, it's also got kind of a bossa nova feel too....

it was a challenge to improvise the guitar solo over the chord changes, as there was a key change in almost every measure

when I compose, I don't really think about how hard it will be to improvise a guitar solo over it, I'm concerned first about the melody and chords, then sometimes I find out later that's it's a real challenge to improvise over it....jazz/fusion great Alan Holdsworth composes that way too, except his music is even more harmonically complex and more difficult to improvise over.

"Secrets"--

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.asp?...ile=5366_387844

I'm on guitars, and Dustin Chang is on alto sax (he's a damn good jazz saxophone player by the way, I have him soloing on some of my other compositions that I will be posting in a little while, he doesn't play a solo on this one though. My guitar solo was a second take, it's not too bad, but Dustin can play awesome solos on the very first take and I have some even more complex compositions and he just blazes over them)

[MakahaMusic]

here's another one from years ago

it's going the other direction I guess, a little more commercial sounding than the four directly above

this was the very first time I had used a drum machine, so it's pretty crude/raw

I play guitars, keyboards, and bass, Dustin Chang plays soprano saxophone and has a very sweet improvised solo at the end, and that was a first take, my guitar solo was a first take too, very raw with string noises, and buzzes but it was improvised. I didn't have a REAL keyboard back then (I have an XP80 synth/sequencer now), so it was kind of hard to play the cheap keyboard decently

Colors--

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...ssionINDEX=6750

[MakahaMusic]

this one was recorded on my Roland VS-1680, and at this time, I finally learned how to mike a tenor saxophone correctly....where to aim the microphone at the tenor sax and at what angle (it's not directly at the bell).... I get a pretty good tone on Dustin's tenor sax, he plays a juicy solo on this one, I play the guitars

Kona Winds--

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...sionINDEX=16482

[MakahaMusic]

this is a contemporary jazz piece with flute

North Shore:

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...sionINDEX=11115

[MakahaMusic]

this next one might offend some people....

extreme dissonance may cause stomach ulcers, nausea, headache, and in severe cases death

.

lol

anyways, my friend is helping me arrange this for big band, with the trumpets playing the main melody, and the saxes playing the countermelody, this is just a rough demo with a drum loop and guitars and I played the notes as a line, not as a chord--the way the horns would play the chords.

this could probably also work as a modern jazz accapella piece too, but the singers would need a very good ear to sing the close harmonies

the form is ABCABC.... with a coda at the end

I repeated the form 5 times for the arrangers sake, so he could listen to the progression over and over again while writing down/tranposing the parts for the trumpet, trombones and saxes.

well here's the link:

Spam Again?--

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...ssionINDEX=2377

[MakahaMusic]

....well to relieve any shock

or discomfort from the dissonance of the composition in the previous post above,

here's a less dissonant (by far) piece....

i guess you could consider this contemporary/smooth jazz

this is another older piece I tranferred from my old cassette multitrack Tascam 488, and this one was the third time I ever used a drum machine, so it's still pretty rough/raw....

As you can tell by the last 7 or 8 compositions or so, my background is originally in jazz, then I gravitated to pop, R&B, blues, rock, country, reggae, electronica, etc....I don't know how that happened but it did....

.....out of about 150 songs and compositions that I wrote, about 50 are jazz compositions, but I don't know how much of that influence you can hear in the first songs in this thread, i guess it's kinda strange

I played guitars and bass on this one, along with programming the drum machine....

"Palolo"--

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...ile=5366_389709

[MakahaMusic]

now for something completely different....

....for all you electric guitar players....

see if you can figure out what I'm doing

I promise I didn't speed this recording up....I really can play like this

During summer vacation after my freshman and sophomore years in high school, I practiced every day for an average of 11 hours per day....arpeggios and scales....11 hours per day, with a break for meal times and a shower and a few 10 minute breaks, during those breaks I'd read guitar player magazine articles or listen to music to be effficient

I watched no TV, I tore down all posters of girls on my wall, anything that would create a distraction....

As you could probably guess, I didn't have much of a social life, I hardly even saw my friends, but I got pretty damn good on electric guitar lol

Well, tell me if you can figure out how I'm doing this....

guitar solo--

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.php?...ile=5366_390478

of course, this is just pure blasting.....

....but I can play in context too, in this next one, the guitar solo on this one has some of these technical elements in it, I play all the instruments on this one:

http://www.broadjam.com/player/player.asp?...file=5366_80181