So it's been a bit over two months since I started trying to really write music again. So far I have spent over 500 dollars on vsts. Things I bought that I no longer use (it takes months to figure that out):
TALMOD 60 dollars
TAL UNO LX 60 dollars
I love the idea of TALMOD. I didn't like that it wasn't microtonal. And I have finally come across stuff that just has a better sound. TAL UNOLX I bought without demo'ing it enough. The sound just doesn't fit well in my stuff...
Bazille 130 dollars
I bought this because I wanted something that was FM and microtonal. It's a pretty good sound but it's not really FM. Not in the true sense of the word. Perhaps it you're amazing at programming it can manage. I have used in some songs. It can make a nice sound but not using it much.
Hive2 150 dollars
Very popular with a nice sound. I have used it with some success. Not quite my favorite but it's pretty good.
TAL Sampler 60 dollars
I need to use it more. Haven't used samples like I should. They take more work. It's hard in that my house is always loud. Really there isn't a time I can make samples unless I get up in the middle of the night while everyone is sleeping.
Synthmaster 2.9 90 dollars (and then it was 60 the next day)
Terrible name but sounds the best of anything I have. Just starting to use it. Trying to learn int.
Minimonsta 140 dollars...??
Love the morphing function and has a cool sound. Really wish other vsts had the melohman octave.
FRMS (Imaginando)  60 dollars
I really wanted something granular. This was only 60 while Quanta is 100 and Straylight is 200. Probably not a great buy though. I like straylight's sound much better.
Kick, Clap and Snare from 2getheraudio 30 dollars


Geez that's 800 dollars. Most kind of wasted but it's so hard to know. Some have limited time demos and it can take months to really know. Those with unlimited time have periodic crackles that could drive you crazy if you waited a few months to decide.

https://soundclick.com/r/s8c7uq
Stray Monsters- I really like it. I have vocals written that I haven't added. In part because, again, it's never quiet enough in the house. I have been told it sucks. That it's just wandering around aimlessly. Like Bach. I like it. But such criticisms have affected me and I will try to do different in the future.
Additional issues are that it's only a few instances when it ought to be 30 at a bare minimum. For this kind of song. But the melohman octave keeps it varied despite being a few instances.

https://soundcloud.com/translucenttelemachy/empphryio-neptunus-osc133
This is for the OSC competition using a free synth called Cheeze Machine 2. At the time I thought the vst was terrible. I don't plan on using it again. But it did get a few cool sounds. Competition hasn't voted yet. This is probably too slow. Not high enough energy. And not complicated enough to do well. Also the second melody sound conflicts a bit with the bass. But I liked it. This vst was pretty much incapable of drums and I didn't try to force it.

https://soundcloud.com/translucenttelemachy/real-life-caricatures
This is Straylight piano, plus HG piano (HG in pythagorean fifths for detuned effect) and minimonsta. I like it a lot. But not the sort of thing people are into. But I really like it. Enough to try to put in on a streaming service?? Probably not....??

https://soundcloud.com/translucenttelemachy/twilight-race
Originally written using z3ta+ (1 or 2...? I found both free. No longer available for sale.)
Then I went back and replaced everything with Hive 2 except one sound. It's high energy. A bit bland. Drums aren't doing anything interesting. Good enough for streaming service like Amazon...? Not really. Not quite.

https://soundcloud.com/translucenttelemachy/cooperative-time-travel
This is perhaps my favorite though it feels so fast that it's a bit exhausing to listen to. The bells at least slow it down a bit and has the slow part in the middle. Hive 2 possibly with a few other bits. Maybe my best. I guess.

https://soundcloud.com/translucenttelemachy/flying-sebastians
Originally I really liked  the slow morph of resonance I had going with Bazille. It seems like I reduced it maybe a bit much or got used to hearing it. Now I don't like the very beginning. Perhaps a bit murky in middle. Like the previous two it has bluearp doing a octave arp throughout most, which maybe gets a bit exhausting.

For a bit over two months when I was spending a lot of time demo'ing/acquiring. I managed to write 6 I think decent songs. (And others that aren't so good. A couple blah microtonal and an ambient that is sort of soothing but doesn't compare well to others out there. And many more not completed..) Compared to what I did before I think they're an improvement. But not good enough. Not even close. Maybe entering the OSC each month will help me. Need more instances. More variation and better sounding drums. More variations in volume and how much is happening. And VOCALS!

My nephew is into music and has a 17 year old friend that thinks he's some kind of hotshot composer/musician. I like some of his music though I like mine better. I told him one of his songs I didn't care for it (I was nice about it) and he responded a bit like a nut trashing me as a composer, going on and on about how I had no idea what I was doing and sounded absolutely terrible. He then attempted suicide for at least the 3rd time a few hours later (I hope it was unrelated but I do wonder if guilt played a role, along with the harmful anti-depressants he's on and just not being super smart... His mom says he should stop the medications and he continues them because he hates her....). Music is a subjective. It only bothers me a little having mine ridiculed. I do think it can improve certainly. Will keep trying.

....and I changed my mind. Bazille maybe isn't so good for FM. Demo'd FM8. Sounds so much better and does correct ratios like Dexed. Bazille does a lot of junky sounds when I try FM and doesn't have the ratios. Fm8 and Dexed aren't full microtonal but Zebra2 is and it appears to be much better for FM than Bazille.

As to tal uno lx, bazille does those sort of sounds better and also repros. Also hive 2, seems better. Though I shouldn't have bought it.

I downloaded all my old computer music onto new. Didn't go well. A lot of song files won't open because certain vsts won't transfer. And it seems I deleted all the song files I most wanted. Almost all the microtonal and the good piano. I think i used z3ta+... And my favorite. "Yeah I heard it."

I think I can recreate it... but I would like to know what synth that was. I may have only used it once.

I was happier playing piano. The recording music is frustrating and ultimately harder/more time consuming and so far more expensive (spent about 400 so far and it's mostly probably bad buys) and less rewarding.

I know the end result will be silence. But I wan't something I believe enough in to really push, try to get out on the big streaming sites.

Played great tennis this weekend.
Ball toss is from right to left. Keep racquet faced closed throughout forehand.

One FM, one subtractive and one sampler all with full microtonal capabilities and of course good sound. Additionally no big companies if possible. And yes it is possible. TAL Sampler, UNO LX and Bazille. And lots of fx etc.

I was using TALMOD and Dexed but neither does microtonal. Not sure unolx can replace it by itself... will see. Certainly sounds good though. So now learning bazille which is cool. More possibilities than Dexed and seems to be capable of the same sounds. Finding I like "FM" more.

Chorus patches layered on drums seem good. Possibly also for vocoder. Hard to say. Some promising vocoder sounds but sometimes not quite good enough.

Using Sevish scale workshop for creating tuning temperaments. Wrote a couple incomplete things that sound good lately. Including some vocals, vocoder and not that are better than before.

I don't have time for this and piano. I will attempt to mostly maintain somehow.

I feel mortal. And that something bad will eventually happen at work. Or not but probably will still die. Hope I get a couple more decades.

Much that I failed at to varying degrees with electronic music I'm trying again at now. It has been 5 to 8 years ago that I gradually gave up.

Some new plugins are the TAL stuff along with Tunefish4. This is based off of listening to KVR one synth monthly challenge for last ten plus years along with numerous best plugin lists. At first I was thinking u-he along with crystal but actually there is something special about the first mentioned imo.

There is new tech out now. Drums are easier. Useful books more readily available. CPU is not an issue. Nor is money really. Also I'm satisfied that hardware isn't some holy grail.

I will figure out low latency midi/audio in on my gaming computer damnit. Having much harder time than previous computers. And I will get a vocoder working. And a sampler in the true sense.
I will write better stuff. Less repetitive. Read some mixing books. Possibly the 500 piano hours will help.

As to piano in attempting to increase my "storage capacity" I'm rotating through 3 days separate days of repetoire. Mostly improving stuff and reremembering past stuff. I have about 10 memorized and another 5 half memorized. I feel like my ability to improvise is improving by making educated guesses as to what comes next.

As to piano I became unhappy with forgetting past pieces. So I have refreshed Rachmaninoff c sharp prelude, chopin funeral march and reremembering Beethoven's 19th and Gladiolus Rag...and Beethoven's7th 2nd movement. Along with continuing to play the 5 Bach pieces I learned and trying to find time to learn Chopin nocturnes and maintain canon in d, Pathetique 2nd movement. Etc
Along with Really learning the technical details of some synthesizer stuff and having two small children. So not enough time.

Put aside John Field for now and little to no meaningful time spent sight reading.

And I still have friends who want to do stuff together.

My nephew wanted to borrow a few musical instruments. By chance I also gave him my microbrute. Which is a hardware analog synth. I have that and also an ensoniq esq and casio cz 101 but I never really did much with them. I had one piece i did with a hardware synth. I think the ensoniq...? It was good but I lost interest. I did make ten hours with soft synths.

I gave it to him and it stimulated my interest. I wanted to mess around with the microbrute's sequencer. I never hardly had before. It was an impulse buy while I was very sick. One of the first affordable analog synths. But it sounds very dirty, brutish. Not "warm" or "organic". Cold and metalic and just rough. But with the sequencer going fast (and perhaps a good reverb pedal) could still make something nice.

So while he had it for 3 weeks or so I wondered and watched some videos. I have it back now. And I have a much better understanding of how to use it finally. Reverb pedal should arrive today.

But it's really quite limited. Monophonic. Only one LFO. I actually downloaded a couple apps to try to get a second LFO. (It's semi-modular.) But they don't work great. It's so limited I got to thinking about buying another. Maybe even a eurorack.

But as opposed to spending thousands I recall I had all kinds of free soft synths that could do tons and tons of stuff. And analog is mostly kind of harsh anyway it seems.

So time permitting I want to go back to softsynths. I want to use some from way back along with a few new. I want to really learn how to use Crystal, which as hardware would probably be 2 grand at least. I want to improve my understanding of Synth1. Also want to get better at synth drums.

I got away from it because electronic music isn't so great for live performance. But for live the only things that really give harmony plus melody like I want are guitar and keyboards. And I just prefer keyboards. They can look a bit goofy live but that's what I prefer. And you certainly can play a softsynth with a keyboard controller. So what the hell.

I can sit around pleasantly strumming a guitar. And ok that's nice. But I still would like to make Skinny Puppy /Download type music and I would like to be able to make just about any sound using a synth, not clicking through presets.

And I'd like to make decent drums. It's something I failed at previously. I don't like to give up.

10.18.19
B2p no1 2:55
Memorized no13 1st page HS

11.1.19
Ok so in less than 20 days I have b2part 1,4 and 13 decently well memorized. Just need to gain speed. Not sure how long that will take. Trying to play them at least 3 times each every day. Which takes 30 minutes now.
Bach air on g is half memorized. Frustratingly slow. Can't break it down or chunk it up. Really want to get on to field nocturne 1 which appears far easier.
Haven't been sight reading. No time. I should make time. Ought to sight read field nocturne 1 even though i already memorized the first page HS.

Reading The Long War series by AJ Smith. The Lovecraftian monsters are nice. I like Randall and the Gorlan mother. It's ok.

If I didn't previously mention it Lilith by Geirge Macdonald is good. Need to finish it. Ought to be a tv show or something. It's up there with Lewis. Surprised i never hear much about Macdonald.

And Senlin series by Josiah Bancroft is good. Vaguely steampunkish. Nice main character. Nice characters in general. Awaiting book 4.