Introduction to Music Technology - Essay Example

Introduction to music technology “Someone like you” is a very famous song by the English singer and songwriter Adele. The song was mutually written by Adele and Dan Wilson for “21”, Adele’s career’s second album. Adele’s last broken relationship inspired her to write the lyrics of the song and they indeed speak for Adele herself. The song was released by XL recordings, as the second single of Adele’s album on January 24, 2011 in UK, whereas it was released on August 9, 2011 in US. The song was critically acclaimed and received positive review from majority of the music critics, who considered the song to be the highlight of her album. The music critics also praised the lyrics and the natural and simple tone of Adele’s voice. Adele was offered her first recording contract from XL Recording after her demo was posted online by her friend. It was immediately a year after it that Adele received the critics’ choice award at Brit Awards and she also won the award for BBC Sound of the Year. Her first debut album “19” was released in the year 2008 and it immediately turned out to be a commercial and critical success. It was declared double platinum in US and four times platinum in UK. Adele experienced a career boost after she appeared on the show “Saturday night live” in 2008. She was also awarded “The Female Pop Vocal Performance” and “The Best New Artist” at the 51st annual Grammy awards. Adele’s second album named 21 set a world record, as it sold more than 28 million copies worldwide. For the completion of the song Adele collaborated with the successful producer and musician Dan Wilson. Before her meeting with Wilson, Adele wrote the lyrics of the song. Both of them practiced and brainstormed various lyrics and melodies. The song was recorded by Adele at the Harmony Studio that is present in West Hollywood California and Dan Wilson was on the Piano during the song. At that time Phillip Allen was the recording engineer. The mixing of the song was however done by Dan Parry and Tom Elmhirst, while the mastering of the song was completed by Tom Coyne. The song has a certain history, as lyrically it speaks about the end of relationship with her log time lover. The song also shows Adele confronting his marriage. At the starting of the song Adele sings a line which indicated that her boyfriend has now settled and has married someone else, which is accompanied by simple piano melody. The lyrics of the song indicate that what once was in Adele’s life and what could have been. Dan Wilson states that when Adele first came to the session with the melody of the song and first half of the song lyrics, it presented the vibe and the idea of the song already. She told Wilson that she wants to pen down a song about her heartbreak. She was told Wilson a little about the guy she broke up with. She told Wilson that she wanted to keep the song direct, simple and personal. According to the sheet music that was published by Sony Music at Musicnotes.com, “Someone Like You” by Adele is a slow tempo song based on 67 beats per minute. The song is written in common time and the vocal ranges of Adele extents from F#3 to E5 during the whole song. The song is said to be a lamenting ballad that pairs the voice of Adele with the winding piano line. “Someone Like You” is the total opposite of “Rolling In The Deep” in reference to the lyrics, in which Adele narrates the end of her relationship. Sean Fennessey of the “Village Voice” says that the voice of Adele goes up to the full octave and that also into a shrieked whisper, a she proceed with the part of the chorus. Adele then rebounds and gathers herself. Her voice later in the song descends into its fullest and into the melancholy state. The introspective lyrics of the song and the maturity of Adele’s voice have been praised by the critics. “Someone Like You” by Adele has been compared to her song “Hometown Glory” from the album “19”. MusicOHM’s John Murphy says that one of the facts that contributes to the success of the song is that it casts Adele as the spurned lover, who has turned outside the house of her ex who is now married and settled and begs to give her a second chance. Aamir Yaqub of “Soul Culture” states that when you talk of lost love, this song is considered to be quite emotional and the vocal performance by Adele makes the narrative tangible. The song was addressed as “spine tingling piano ballad” by Cameron Adams of Herald Sun (Waterman, 2012). “Someone Like You” is the only song in the history of music just based on vocal and guitar that was able to make it to the number one spot. Recording the song in acoustic piano is a challenge for the music engineers. The depressing key of the piano has been used by Wilson for starting a complex lever in motion, which creates the sound that we hear in the starting of the song. A variety of miking techniques have been used by Wilson on his piano starting from balanced to persuasive, from bright to mellow and from narrow to wide. The tail of the piano has been used by Wilson to create the warmer tone, which gives the song its warmer tone. The lid of the piano has however affected the dispersion of high frequencies in several different ways, which have bounced them towards the audience. Wilson does this quite effectively along the line of the hammer of the instrument. Wilson radiates the sound of the piano in two directions during the whole song. Another effective decision made by Wilson was that he effectively placed the piano at an accurate distance from the mike. As you can observe that the sound of the instrument was not that reverberant as it was placed at a perfect distance from the mike After hearing the original recording of “Someone Like You” one can guess that the mike was tuck close to the music stand, which effectively covered the two halves of the register of the instrument. The first live performance was given by Adele on “Someone Like You” on the BBC music show. Later she also performed at the BRIT awards in 2011. According to Gina Sepre of E! Online, Adele’s performance was so impactful even though there were no pyrotechnics, no lavender hair, no acrobatics and no auto tunes. Chris Coplan of the consequences of sound writes about Adele’s performance saying that “someone like you” has increased the power of the barebones. He further added that it was a booming performance that was able to capture the attention of the people. “Someone Like You” was added to the set list of the Adele’s second tour, where Adele performed live on the song. Joanne Dorkan of MTV, while reviewing Adele’s concert said that he did not see any dry eye in the house, as Adele’s ballad as well as her voice changed the whole atmosphere, encouraging the audience to sing with her the beautiful yet emotional chorus of her hit song. The song literally gave the audience goosebumps. He also said that it seemed as if the sound of Adele’s “Someone Like You” bounced from every wall and stroked the string of every heart present in the room which was indeed a very special moment and gave something to the Apollo crowd that they will not forget for a very long time. Jim Harrington of the Mercury News also added that this song was the highlight of the show and presented the supreme vocal talent of Adele. The arrangement of the song was beautiful over the simplest and most mesmerizing chord of pattern. The arrangement of the song goes like this that first the pianist has to take a simple argeggio figure, than he has to move to the lower note, then simply pattern down a step to #G, then to #F and then to the major chord D resulting in the chords that will actually be A, C#m, F#m7, D. The chorus of the song had a standard progression which was I- V-VI-IV or A, E, F#m, D. This progression has indeed been used in the successful Axis of Awesome Four chord video which present that how many songs have actually been played using this progression. “Someone like you” became an immediate hit as the song was simply played on a piano and the supreme vocals that were used by Adele spell bound almost everyone. Adele was personally attached to the song as she even penned down the lyrics of the song herself. The song was critically acclaimed and was a considered a great hit in USA as well as UK. Adele received several awards and international recognition for her song. Bibliography Waterman, D., 2012. The Story Behind The Song: Adele, “Someone Like You”. [Online] Available at: http://www.americansongwriter.com/2012/01/the-story-behind-the-song-adele-someone-like-you/ [Accessed 2014 July 2014]. Read More