Chapter 73 (2/2)

“But you made that song for Seung Hee.”

“Not exactly. I just made the song because I liked her voice when she sang the jazz song I arranged.”

“It’s a song created for a voice and not a person?”

“Wow, you speak so well. A song created for a voice. I’ll have to keep this memorized.”

Yoon Jung Su saved his words as he looked at a Jun Hyuk who was smiling naively. He thought that there would be no need to explain about things like money, business, and industry fees to a child who was only just 17 years old. He comforted himself thinking that as someone with a right to the song, he could just push it back.

It was an old song. No matter when it was released, they could get the tribute for it.

“Alright. Then we’ll think about that song later and make the mission song now. I’ll put two producers I work with on you, so try making something really cool.”

“The pressing birds you talked about?”

“Ha ha. Yeah, pressing bird. But you can’t call them that to their faces. It’s a term that denigrates them.”

***

Jun Hyuk spent half a day using his cellphone and listening to a computer hard drive with a sound library full of sound effects. It was full of all the sounds in the world. It was to the point where he wondered what had not been included since there were even the sounds of people yawning and burping in different versions.

After half a day passed, Jun Hyuk abandoned his intention to listen to all of the sounds in the world. Eventually, he did not even get to listen to half and picked among the sound effects used often in the electronic line that the producer chose to listen to.

After the group of sound effects was compiled, Jun Hyuk and the two producers sat in front of a monitor that showed sounds from the master keyboard. The people at Jo Hyung Joong’s studio had already let them know that Jun Hyuk is a perfectionist. They had heard that he even detected the sound of an oboe bouncing off of a music stand.

If a kid with an ear like this had the ability to see soundwaves with his eyes, it was obvious that he would not look past even the smallest issues. The two producers already had a grim feeling that they may need to work for the next few days to complete the song.

“First off, do you have a separate track for the voice of the song Teacher Yoon chose?”

“Of course. Do you want it?”

“Yes. Please let me hear them in order.”

Jun Hyuk kept working on stretching and shortening the vocal tracks of the four songs. In more extreme cases, he did not hesitate to shorten it by three times. A producer threw him a question,

“But Jun Hyuk, you’re not going to sample it? What verse are you going to take out to use? Isn’t it easier to take out just that part to work with?”

“No, I’m not sampling it. I’m going to use all of it.”

“What? You’re going to use the whole song?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t think you should do that. I’m pretty sure it’ll just be noisy once you mix the other four songs.”

“That’s why I’m matching the four songs. First, I’m going to hold the place and adjust the volume.”

After playing with the track for several hours, he had a satisfied expression.

“The vocal track is finished… and we have to put in the violin…..”

“Violin? You’re finished already? You finished the four songs?”

“Yes. Can you set this master keyboard to the violin?”

The producer did not get to listen to the entirety of the song that he finished. Fixing one part and listening again to edit again… Jun Hyuk was done in one go without working like this.

“But Jun Hyuk. You don’t need to listen to the work you did?”

“Why? I saw everything with my eyes.”

“You know by looking at the soundwaves?”

“Yes. I think it’s much more comfortable being able to see the sound with my eyes. This program is really good.”

The producers did not say more. They now thought that they would not need to have questions for Jun Hyuk any longer.

“You’re saying it’s like that. Um… oh, okay. You see these two dials? The one on top is the vibrato effect, and the bottom has the slide effect.”

“Okay. Then.”

Jun Hyuk pressed a few of the keys to test it out and laughed as though it was wondrous. It was because he was pressing the keyboard, but there was the sound of the violin.

“He he he. This is really fun.”

As he put both of his hands on the keyboard, he played the familiar Vivladi’s part 1 of Four Seasons Spring. After that, he played multiple classicals but did not play over 8 verses.

Soundtracks kept collecting on the monitor.

As he got used to using the master keyboard, his hands became faster. After the violin, he changed to the bass guitar and held the whole beat.

The producer who was listening next to him guessed that the beat was around 150BPM. It seemed a little slow, but there was no way to check because he could not listen to the whole song.

When Jun Hyuk finished the bass guitar, he stretched his arms and back and got up from his seat.

“Let’s start again after a break.”

“We haven’t done anything. You did everything yourself.”

“This is the real start.”

“What? Then what have you done ‘til now?”

“This is the combination for the bass sound. It’s the color tone that won’t be that noticeable. Now we need to work on the riff (key melody line), the drum that will point out the beat, and sound effects.”

They also passed out when they heard that everything he had done until now was just the background. The bigger problem was that Jun Hyuk had not once listened to the results of his hard work so far.

“Uh Jun Hyuk, we have to hear it first. I’m really curious too.”

“Ah, sorry. I thought you already knew because we worked on it together.”

“We’re not geniuses. We have no idea what any of this is just by looking at it. Ha ha.”

Jun Hyuk’s first electronic. Half with curiosity and half with expectations, Yoon Jung Su, Jang Na Rae, and Kwak Hye Sung came to listen to Jun Hyuk’s first piece together.