Love & Time is the fourth track in the Free Short Instrumentals series. It is a solo piano instrumental that has a nostalgic feel. The song was played on a Korg M50 synthesizer.
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Free Background Music 43: The Sea Withdrew
1. The Music
The Sea Withdrew is the 43rd song in my Free Background Music series. It is a quiet and gentle piano instrumental that switches between major and minor keys. The song was played on Korg M50 Synth. The composition was inspired by all the problems we have been facing during 2020. It has a sad and somber feel, but includes key changes to major keys in order to show a feeling of hope. The song starts in the key of C minor and ends in C major.
Read More »Free Background Music 40: Tale of the Forgotten Forest Kingdom by Kate Kwok
This beautiful and lyrical original piano instrumental is composed and performed by Kate Kwok. It is the 40th song in the Free Background Music series.
Read More »Free Background Music 38: Somewhere Deep in the Sea by Jessica Yip
Here is the latest addition to the Free Background Music Series. This beautiful piano instrumental is composed and and performed by Jessica Yip. This is a beautiful piano instrumental is a gentle piano song that is suitable for use as a soundtrack for touching, tranquil or nostalgic scenes. As the title suggests, the scene she had in mind when composing the song was a setting deep underwater.
Read More »Free Background Music Series 37: Holly’s Theme
Holly’s Theme, the 37th song in the Free Background Music series, is a piano instrumental. The video for this song features dancers from Georgia (the country), Japan, the US and the Czech Republic. I composed this song as part of the soundtrack for a short film my students were working on (Holly is the name of one of the characters). Kate Kwok performed the music and was responsible for much of the arrangement. There is also a bonus track at the end—a one-minute orchestral version of the slow part of the song. This shorter work is the 17th song in the Free Short Instrumentals series.
Duration: 2:47
Read More »Free Background Music 35: Broken
Here is the 35th song in our Free Background Music series—Broken. It is a gentle and melancholy minimalist piano ballad about the unexpected end of a friendship. For this video, I collaborated with Lee Chan, who choreographed and performed the ballet, and Kate Kwok, who arranged and performed the song.
The mood of the piece is melancholy. The song is influenced by classical minuets and has the ABA structure and 3/4 time signature associated with that form. However, the arrangement is rather sparse and minimalist in style, giving the song a more contemporary feel. This song is about the sudden and unexpected end of a friendship.
Duration: 3:17
Read More »Free Background Music 34: I Vow to Thee, My Country
We continue our Featured Guest series with Kate Kwok performing her own arrangement of I Vow to Thee, My Country by Gustav Holst and Sir Cecil Spring Rice (1921). This is a beautiful piano arrangement that evokes a strong feeling of nostalgia.
This song is the 34th song in the Free Background Music series. It is Kate’s own arrangement of a classical work by Gustav Holst. The music originally comes from from the Jupiter movement of Gustav Holsts’s orchestral suite The Planets. Holst adapted his own music, creating this lovely and moving nostalgic song — I Vow to Thee, My Country— in 1921.
Read More »Free Background Music 30: Echoes & Fragments
Echoes & Fragments is the 30th song in the Free Background Music series. It is a gentle and minimalist synth-piano song (performed on a Korg M50 synthesizer and recorded using Cakewalk’s Sonar Home Studio). The name of the song is about memory. As I get older, long-term memories fragment and slip away; sometimes they resurface, bubbling up from the boundless sea of time; sometimes they simply sink and are never seen again. For many memories, I am unsure whether I am remembering the actual event or remembering a story that I once told or that someone once told me. Do I remember the house I grew up or do I simply remember its image from photographs? It seems that a lot of what I call ‘memories’ are merely faint and distant echoes.
The video features public domain footage from NASA.
Duration: 3:00
Tempo: Around 70 bpm
Free Background Music 25: Memoryne
Memoryne is the 25th song in the Free Background Music Series. It is a gentle and melodic piano instrumental. The mood is nostalgic; it is somewhat sad, but light at the same time. Though it is classical in style, the harmonic progression is inspired by the jazz standard My Funny Valentine.
Tempo: 116 bpm
Duration: 2:30
Alternative Version: Music Box Version (55 seconds)
Here is a version of the main theme of Memoryne but in a music box style.The middle part ended up being too busy (too many notes), so this arrangement features the main melody only.
Free Background Music 22: As Long as a Word Remains Unspoken
As Long as a Word Remains Unspoken is the 22nd song in the Free Background Music series. This is a very gentle and wistful synth-piano instrumental with a slightly East-Asian feel to the melody. The song was played on a Korg M50 synthesizer and recorded using Sonar Home Studio.
Tempo: 65 bpm (The tempo is actually 130 bpm, but the feeling is more like 65 bpm.)
Duration: 2:14
Longzijun 