Somehow it took me this long to get around to analyzing "Thriller." Here's a tempo map, showing the range between 116 and 120 BPM. It shows that all that drum machine stuff is being tapped out by humans with their fingers in real time, and that those humans are unbelievably steady.
I used Ableton to visualize the counterpoint and form in the Beatles' "Blackbird"
What do we think about the assertion in this meme? I know, we think it's asinine, but I'm looking for specific arguments as to why it's asinine.
Here's the tempo map of "Billie Jean" also showing a range of 20 BPM above and below the starting tempo. That is *insanely* steady. But there's also enough variation to tell me that there isn't a click or a drum machine under there.
To quantify: here's the tempo map of "Dear Prudence" showing a range of 20 BPM above and below their starting tempo. They drift quite a lot!
Handy reference for my aural skills students for identifying the diatonic modes, enjoy
My "Dear Prudence" session is the gold standard: stems and MIDI! Most tunes don't get this depth of analysis or organization because, well, most tunes aren't "Dear Prudence"
Oh, and so, what is in these folders? Ableton sessions! Here's a representative one, for "If I Fell" by the Beatles. The audio is warped out to the grid and labeled/color-coded to show structure. I use empty MIDI clips to show chords, keys, hypermeter and so on.
I'm working on a thing about the Lyn Collins Yeah Woo break and thought you might enjoy seeing my annotation of the waveform
I unironically love "Versace" by Migos and the Genius annotation of the chorus is sensational
I Googled Betty Davis and the AI summary gave me a picture of Bette Davis, AGI is upon us
I'm offering my first online songwriting class open to the general public this summer, and we're taking registrations for one more week, so if you are curious about this, now is the time! www.ethanhein.com/wp/2025/one-...
Here are my NYU aural skills students sight-reading an etude I wrote for them. I love this job so much.
Just wanted to show off how well organized my theory examples are becoming - these are all Ableton sessions with the recording warped out, color-coded and annotated
For class tomorrow: "My Favorite Things" as recorded by Julie Andrews above, and by John Coltrane below. We're discussing the copyright status of Coltrane's arrangement and improvisation (it has none)