Star Tower

Star Tower is a song about a man who, searching for wisdom, seeks vainly to find it in creation rather than in the Creator. But the man encounters Christ and learns of God's plan of love and salvation not only for everyone but for him in particular, causing a conversion of heart.

Star Tower has a rather long and winding history. However, before I elaborate, I should like to clarify one point, namely: none of my music is AI-generated. I write or improvise every note. Typically I write a full score for each song, except for guitar solos, which I prefer to improvise. Yet it does not necessarily follow that I am anti-AI in every respect: in fact, since I cannot currently find a singer, I use Synth V in the studio to "perform" the vocal lines which I compose. In other words, Synth V plays only the music I have personally written. While Synth V does have certain machine learning mechanisms, I emphatically do not allow AI to generate musical ideas. Nor do I collaborate or co-compose with AI.

There is, in my view, an enormous difference between using software that has AI components to execute a vocal line I already composed on the one hand and using AI to take over or augment the composition process on the other hand. In my view, the way in which I use Synth V is akin to using a VST instrument.

Moreover, for the record, I am against AI-generated music. There is, I think, something perverse in allowing AI to take over the creative process. In any event, quite apart from the question of whether or not AI can write decent music, I would say the following: I love to write music, so where is the fun in outsourcing that task? As Tolkien has said, man is happiest when he acts as sub-creator.

One further clarification: I love to play the guitar and have been doing so since age nine. While I do sometimes use VST instruments for non-guitar parts, I greatly enjoy laying down real guitar tracks. In fact, since I am bored by soulless quantized-sounding guitar, I have, over time, developed a tendency to not edit my guitar tracks, i.e., to get the right sound going in and to avoid things like quantization or effects. Indeed, my tone, especially these days, is remarkably simple, achieved by a Stratocaster straight into a Marshall with no dirt pedal (usually no pedals at all) and very light or no reverb. Again, this is an approach that has developed over time and is not necessarily represented in my recording from years ago.

Now, a little about the curious history of Star Tower. About seven years ago, I released most of the tracks on my debut album Christendom Reborn, including a track entitled Teutonic Knights.

All the tracks on Christendom Reborn are guitar instrumentals, and I think Christendom Reborn is indeed a strong guitar instrumental album. Quite apart from my own preferences, certain songs seemed to resonate with listeners more than others. One song that received unusually positive feedback was Teutonic Knights. This feedback, combined with the absolutely awesome Vivaldi-inspired solo section, prompted me to revisit Teutonic Knights.

After listening to the track again, I felt I had a very solid guitar instrumental; but increasingly I wanted to write guitar-centric music with vocals. Therefore, I decided to reforge Teutonic Knights with vocals.

After some digging, I unearthed the original sheet music for Teutonic Knights. Back when I wrote the score, I was in the habit of working at a feverish pace, and I recall writing the score and recording the track in the space of a few days. Because I worked so quickly in those days, the score was more of a skeleton wherein many sections merely suggested a general idea rather than specifying every note. The exception was the Vivaldi-inspired solo, which was written in great detail.

I began fleshing out the score, relearning parts, and re-recording Teutonic Knights. But something funny happened. Quite naturally, without any foreknowledge on my part, “Star Tower” began to emerge from my reforging of Teutonic Knights!

I really liked the changes, so I kept going—and the result is Star Tower, an entirely different and unique song that nevertheless bears a family resemblance to its ancestor, Teutonic Knights.

One of my musical heroes, Antonio Vivaldi, was a master at recycling material and even reworking old ideas into entirely new pieces, and I am quite happy to adopt a similar modus operandi.