It's not far from what I like to do as well to be honest. you don't have to play a chord as a 'block of notes' if you don't want to, you can easily spread things around the parts of the music. I also like to deliberately omitt certain notes of chords too, not always but you can often get less recognisable tones by doing so. When notes are in a closer proximity and clustered, I think that they sound a bit edgier and interesting and perhaps dissonant sometimes. But I'm a big fan of dissonance anyway, what some people find 'out of tune', I can find really interesting.steevio wrote:for instance say you used a quadriad (or tetrad) of C D D#F, you could use only the dyad C and D and use the D# and F at very low volume to add colour (like extensions), then maybe you could invert the chord and emphaise the D# and F and play the C and D as colour, there are lots of combinations of inversions and dyads from just that one tetrachord.kivetros wrote:
And what do you mean by using tones as color, rather than as obvious chord notes?
i tend to leave out any major or minor thirds and 5ths or play them lightly as colours, which kind of takes away the obviousness of them, or only express them in the bass and kick. the notes of chords dont have to be played at the same velocity. theres so many ways to play groups of notes together without resorting to the classic chord progressions.
i usually do this by modulating the various oscillators volumes with envelopes.
anything goes really
The main issues for me with chords are them sounding obvious and too familiar, not just the chord type but also when it's played 'as is', it can sound a little 'chordy' for want of a better word. Other times though, that might be great. I also happen to like Deep House and chords do lend themselves to that music a lot better imo.
Of course you could throw block chords out the windows and perhaps try something like counterpoint, you'd still probably create something that might hint at chords simply by any harmonies produced but they wouldn't be sticking out as block chords or anything. For me chords form an integral part of my musical style and taste though, but not in the way a song writer might use them. I don't know if that makes sense but it's not the easiest thing to explain a 'feel'.