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A Guide To Creating Music:: in Chrome Music Lab Song Maker

This document provides instructions for using the Song Maker tool within Chrome Music Lab to create original songs. It explains the basic workspace layout including beats, measures, notes, drums, melodies, harmonies, instruments, and advanced settings. The summary guides users through selecting notes to create a drum beat, melody, and harmony, then encourages experimenting with other song elements and settings to compose original songs.

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Mul Adi
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2K views7 pages

A Guide To Creating Music:: in Chrome Music Lab Song Maker

This document provides instructions for using the Song Maker tool within Chrome Music Lab to create original songs. It explains the basic workspace layout including beats, measures, notes, drums, melodies, harmonies, instruments, and advanced settings. The summary guides users through selecting notes to create a drum beat, melody, and harmony, then encourages experimenting with other song elements and settings to compose original songs.

Uploaded by

Mul Adi
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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A GUIDE TO CREATING MUSIC:

IN CHROME MUSIC LAB SONG MAKER

Chrome Music Lab is a fun, visually appealing collection of music


apps, created by Google. All of them will run in a simple web
browser. “Song Maker” is the most complex tool on offer, but it’s
still easy for anyone to use. This lesson will explain how!

THINGS YOU’LL NEED


• A device with a web browser
• This link to click now!
https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/Song-Maker/

THE WORKSPACE
1. As you can see, Song Maker is arranged in a simple grid system.
If you try hitting the “play” button, you’ll see a pale blue vertical
line move its way across the screen from left to right.

2. Let’s try creating a note. Click on the bottom line, in the fifth
column -- the mid-point of the screen (see picture above). Then hit
play. You’ll see the Pale Blue Line travel across the screen again.
When it reaches the note (the blue dot), the sound plays, and the
blue dot pulses.
3. Try this out for yourself! Select as many squares as you would
like, then try hitting play.

BEATS AND MEASURES


3. Song Maker should default to a grid like the one pictured above,
with 10 rows and 16 columns. Every two columns, there is a Dark
Blue Line. This represents a “beat.” The white area on the left is
made up of four beats; four beats (usually) adds up to a “measure”
or “bar.” The grey area on the right is the same size (four beats), so
in total, we have two “bars” in the song.
BOUNCING BEATS

4. The two bottom rows are the home of the drum and percussion
sounds in Song Maker. The row all the way at the bottom is for
lower-pitched drum sounds. The row above it is for higher-pitched
drum sounds, and the notes in that row appear as triangles.
5. 2 & 4, aka “The Backbeat.” To make a standard
pop/rock/funk/R&B/hip-hop drum groove, it helps to have triangles
on beats “2” and “4,” which are (conveniently) the second and
fourth dark blue vertical line in each measure (just like in the
picture, above).
6. Try making your own drum groove! You can replicate the one in
this guide, or come up with your own!
MERRY MELODIES

7. One of the best features of Song Maker is its attractive, colorful


way of representing melody and harmony. On default settings, the
Workspace will feature eight rows that can be filled in with colored
squares, as in the picture above. These eight rows are one “octave”
of music, and correspond to the notes in the musical alphabet
(CDEFGABC). Notice that the top and bottom rows are both red,
because they are both the note “C.”
8.Try making some of your own melodies by filling in squares!

HAPPY HARMONIES
9. A “harmony” is when more than one melodic note sounds at the
same time. Three or more notes sounding at the same time are
known as a “chord.” You can easily create harmonies in Song
Maker by selecting notes in the same column. To easily create
pleasant harmonies, leave one row in between the notes you
select, as pictured above.
10. Try creating your own harmonies!

SUPER SONGS

11. You can now create your own songs using Beats, Melodies, and
Harmonies! See what you can come up with!

VIBRANT VOICES

12. Next to the play button, two buttons enable you to cycle
between a variety of different instruments. The left-hand button
controls the melodic voice in your song -- the colorful notes in the
upper rows. The right-hand button controls the percussion sounds
-- the bottom two rows.
SHREDDING SETTINGS

13. You can try moving the “Tempo” slider back and forth to
control the speed of the music. Watch how the Pale Blue Bar
moves more slowly across the Workspace when you hit Play.
14. If you hit the gear-shaped “Settings” icon, you’ll see a variety of
settings, which you’re free to adjust. These are particularly good for
advanced songwriters!

15. The “Length” setting controls how many bars the song
contains. More bars means more columns in the Workspace.
16. “Beats per bar” controls how many dark blue vertical lines
there will be in every measure. Sometimes different styles of music
require different numbers of beats in a bar.
17. By default, Song Maker is set to “split beats into” two parts,
which means that there are Light Blue Vertical Lines in the
Workspace representing “eighth notes” (four beats, split into two
parts each = eight). You can increase this number to get “triplets”
(four beats, split into three parts each = twelve triplets per
measure) or “sixteenth notes” (four beats, split into four parts each
= sixteen). This is useful if you want to try more advanced (or
perhaps more funky) rhythmic ideas.
18. Changing the “Scale” changes the pattern of pitches in the
melodic area of the Workspace. “Pentatonic” scales have a
reduced number of notes (for example, CDEGAC instead of
CDEFGABC), whereas “Chromatic” scales have more notes
(imagine using both the black and white keys on the piano, instead
of only the white ones).
19. “Start On” changes the melodic range of the composition.
“Middle C,” is thought of like “home base” on a piano, but you
might want to write a song that starts on “High C,” or perhaps
“Low B!”
20. Changing the “Range” will add more octaves, and thus more
rows to your Workspace. This is a good option to use as you get
more comfortable with Song Maker, and start composing more
complex songs!
21.Good luck! Have fun Making Songs!

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