We had quite a large studio area at RG Jones, and to cosy it up a bit for Morten we set up three large screens behind him; one directly behind, the other two angled in slightly. "The Tony Mansfield version employed a Fairlight and it just didn't sound like A‑ha at all. Browse our 30 arrangements of "Take on Me." Time that a lot of people doesn't have, a… He and the boys would experiment and go through sounds until they liked something, and then it would be a case of programming it, sometimes combining more than one sound by way of the MIDI'd synthesizers. You can be a great artist, but if you don't have good people around you, nothing is ever going to happen, really.”, "When we were recording 'Take On Me', I had no idea it was going to be the hit it turned out to be,” Gerry Kitchingham now admits. “Take On Me” is a charming bit of goony pop surrealism. The numbers in front of each line are the octave, each octave has an unique color so you can easily follow them. "For all their teenybopper image, A‑ha were three fantastic musicians,” Kitchingham says. The melody, the lyrics, the whole sound of the thing just gelled. Two or three albums later it would be a different story, with us spending so much longer recording his vocals and keeping everything. "I'd actually worked with Tony on another project, so I knew what to expect even before I pressed the 'play' button. In this instance, he just sang through 'Take On Me' about four times, Alan and I told all three boys to take a break while we pieced the whole thing together, and we then got Morten back in to drop in a few small parts. The song combines synthpop with a varied instrumentation that includes acoustic guitars, keyboards, and drums. "I remember thinking the demo sounded really, really good, whereas that and the Tony Mansfield recording were worlds apart,” adds Gerry Kitchingham, who engineered the RG Jones sessions. Nor was it simply a matter of price-consciousness—by 1985, when Magne Furuholmen of the band A-ha sat down in front of a synthesizer to pound out the catchy riffs of the MTV hit “Take on Me,” his synth of choice was a Roland Juno-60 (although for some reason a Prophet-5 was used in the MTV video). Take On Me by a-ha easy piano letter notes: e e c a a d d d F F g a g g g d c e e e d d e d e e c a a d d d F F g a g g g d ... Each group of letter notes is played from left to right, and vertical letters on the same column are played together. "In those days, I'd always record with Gerry Kitchingham at RG Jones and then I would usually go to Mayfair to mix with John Hudson. I was really impressed straight away. "That song really sparkles because of the great vocal by Morten, and it also has those quirky little keyboard and synth parts that were just so lovely to hear when they were being performed in the studio. At the same time, while the quality of the Linn's snare, toms and kick drum was quite good, its cymbal sounds were a bit crappy — no high end. That budget was supposed to pay for the musicians, but I found a studio that would give me a whole day for £150 and, being self‑taught, I played all the instruments myself. He was absolutely brilliant at doing that — I've never seen anyone as good as him at programming a Linn.”. I couldnt find a 100% correct tab for the chords or the riffs in this great song, so heres my attempt!! 322 notes. 'Take On Me' was a huge hit, but its birth was a difficult one, taking three years, three versions and a pioneering video to finally give A-ha their first chart success. "We learned the massive difference between a [record] company that was completely together and had a focus and a company where that was not the case,” singer Morten Harket commented in a 2009 TV interview. "I wasn't told why, but they wanted to know if I would come in. Time was also a factor with the sessions for 'The Sun Always Shines On TV', A‑ha's follow‑up single to 'Take On Me' which would top the UK chart, en route to selling over five million copies worldwide. Is it really about new sounds these d... Re: The All-New Behringer Keyboards 'n' Stuff Thread. This was used as the drum machine; a mixture of synthesized and live samples courtesy of Tony Mansfield. However, a half‑hearted campaign by the label's UK office ensured that the single still did nothing. John did the mix of 'The Sun Always Shines', whereas Gerry did the mix of 'Take On Me', and that's because we were in the middle of recording 'The Last Kiss' at RG Jones when A‑ha came in to record 'Take On Me'. Lives for gear . 'Take On Me' had a fairly standard Linn snare sound and I just remember compressing it quite heavily to get a very slappy feel. Basically, we're using math to make sounds. Mastering Essentials Part 5 - Compression & Limiting, Mastering Essentials Part 4 - Mastering EQ: Balance, Don’t Match. Check out Lucent's Guide to Online Sequencer. 72 notes. Sound on Sound: Classic Tracks - Take on Me. At that time, he was totally a Fairlight man, and I can imagine why Warners felt his version wasn't quite right compared to the original demo that had all the charm.”. Mastering audio for TV Broadcast for the first time. You may login with either your assigned username or your e-mail address. You could get different quality chips for the Linn, and Alan would sometimes lift the lid, pull out the chips and put in some better ones that he could afford to buy. … Easy tutorial of the song "Take on me" by "A-Ha"I created this tutorial for people which are beginners with piano/keyboard.EnjoyCreated by Remcov250 "As the albums went on and A‑ha's sound became more heavy, we'd start feeding synths into amplifiers and things like that. Alan Tarney loved the fact that this equipment was housed within a fairly compact Eastlake room. I'd say PÃ¥l was the main technology guy, and we worked long hours, cranking out the overdubs. To their mind, the magic of the Rendezvous demos had disappeared and, with it, A‑ha's prominently featured vocal sound. From left to right: PÃ¥l Waaktaar Magne Furuholmen and Morten Harket. Rewind to September 1982, when guitarist PÃ¥l Waaktaar and keyboardist Magne ('Mags') Furuholmen, who had previously played together in a four‑piece band called Bridges, recruited singer Morten Harket from an outfit named Souldier Blue to form A‑ha. You don't have to be great, you just have to know the right things to do.”. On “Miss Eerie,” the instantly recognizable synth line (apparently written by Furuholmen when he was 15) remains intact, even though it’s played on a steel drum. "Both PÃ¥l and Mags were very good instrumentalists — Mags was an excellent keyboard player. Share Reply Quote. As a result, on the records that I subsequently produced I played all the instruments. "As you can tell from the record, he had this incredibly strong falsetto and almost choir‑boyish clarity. If I'd been using my microphone, it would have been a Neumann U87, but Alan had a valve Neumann U47 which we used on 'Take On Me', as well as a Neve microphone preamp and Neve equaliser. Re: Synthesizers. Basic Synth Riff of "Take On Me" by a-ha by TempUser. From left to right: PÃ¥l Waaktaar Magne Furuholmen and Morten Harket.Photo: Retna. The control room at RG Jones, again from the 1985 studio brochure. In America, where the video had cannily been issued to dance clubs and MTV a full month before the single was made available to record stores and radio stations, it went all the way to number one and remained on the Billboard Hot 100 for 23 weeks. "It was because everything went so well with 'Take On Me' that we then almost immediately worked on 'The Sun Always Shines On TV'. Contains complete lyrics This product is available worldwide Available at a discount in the digital sheet music collection: 12 New Wave Classics "Anyway, that's how we built up the track until it was time to do the vocals. The tape machine was run by SMPTE code, so it was locked to the programming instruments, and when it came to the mix Alan dialled up the drums live to save on tracks. Most recent revision: 6/30/17 Take on Me by a-ha. If at first you don't succeed...' That was the credo for 'Take On Me', the synth‑pop classic by the Norwegian trio A‑ha that topped the Billboard Hot 100 and reached number two in the UK in the autumn of 1985. Aankh Marey O Ladki Aankh Mare – Piano Notes; Sukhkarta Dukhharta – Piano Notes for Ganesh Aarti; Mere Rang Me Rangne Wali – Piano Notes; Chura Ke Dil Mera Goriya Chali Piano Notes; We Wish You A Merry Christmas; Jag Mein Sundar Hain Do Naam – Piano Notes; Chalte Chalte Yunhi Koi Mil Gaya Tha – Pakeezah – Piano Notes Still, Warner Brothers' head office in the US believed in both the band and the song, and so, in early 1985, proven hit‑maker Alan Tarney was called in to revamp the track. Only later on did I really get to appreciate it.”, "'Take On Me' incorporates all the best components of A‑ha,” concludes Alan Tarney, who still writes songs in his home studio that, once equipped with a Harrison desk and Studer A80, was the site of recordings such as the Norwegian trio's 1987 'Manhattan Skyline' single. This way, as you play higher notes you don’t hear the rapid beating that too-wide of a detuning will produce. That valve 47 had a lovely sound, and I remember that when I heard Morten sing through that for the first time, the purity of his voice was amazing. It gave PÃ¥l the freedom to write these Linn Drum parts and he was brilliant at that. While John Ratcliff supervised the sessions by way of periodic appearances, he basically let the group work with King, who sat behind an SSL E-series console while using a Studer A800 to record the album's songs to two‑inch tape. Take on Me by A-ha Sections:Intro▢, Intro and Verse◯, Verse and Pre-Chorus▢▢, Chorus▢, Bridge♢. This song is heard on the album 'Hunting High and Low' released in 1985. ... the glimmering little synth chords that interlock throughout. I miked him with a Beyer 201 and a [Neumann] FET 47 placed directly next to each other. The 3:46 end result was far closer in terms of feel to the 3:19 Mansfield‑produced version of 'Take On Me' than the 3:10 King‑engineered version. Learn how to play the Main Riff of ‘Take on Me’ by A-ha. "He was very expressive in terms of how he sang, and he really did go for it. I've watched this video a number of times but it's grainey and the shots are short. Print and download in PDF or MIDI Take On Me. 207 notes. Most of the programs include drum tracks that fit the song and tempo. Producer Alan Tarney during the recording of 'Take On Me'. 0. Provided the tempo and the feel were right, that guide drum track would be fairly simple — not that 'Take On Me' required anything particularly complex — and I'd mix it on two tracks. A lot of the stuff that I needed to control came through the Juno and a [Yamaha] DX7, but then they played the Waves together and that's where the magic seemed to come from. Learn how to play Take On Me by A-ha. "I played 'We Don't Talk Anymore' in the studio, Bruce heard it and he said, 'That would be a good song for Cliff',” Tarney recalls. "At that time, the band were still working at John Ratcliff's studio in Sydenham, so I went to see them there and they did a live performance in front of us all. There was also an RMX15 for stereo delay. If you have a good enough ear, you can use it to pick apart every single note and chord one-by-one just by merely listening and then you can work on playing it along with the recording. "I had worked many times at Eel Pie, and it was after A‑ha had been recording there with Tony Mansfield for a good few weeks that I received a call from the studio manager, telling me Tony was leaving the project,” King recalls. A-ha's second album, Scoundrel Days, was released in the midst of the 1986 world tour, and represented a move towards alternative rock, as synthpop began to fall out of style. By now, 'Lesson One' was titled 'Take On Me'. "Take On Me" is a song by Norwegian synth-pop band A-ha, first released in 1984. I saw them play live in Brighton years back. That's what I used to drive the instruments, and there was a LinnDrum that PÃ¥l programmed. (Furuholmen initially booked time there because he read it had a Space Invaders machine.) More than anything, it was a matter of time.”. Editors' Notes Synthesizers had been slowly percolating into popular music since the late ‘60s, and over the ‘70s they’d serve as a cosmic enhancement on countless prog-rock records. This preceded Tarney's own compositional and production successes. We are excited to announce that Synth Riders has just received an update that brings many improvements utilizing the ultimate power of the Oculus Quest 2.. Before jumping into the details, let me answer the question that we’ve heard a lot recently: Yes, Synth Riders officially supports custom songs on the Oculus Quest 2, too! "Maybe that's because I was making records every day, but it didn't really jump out at me. That's why it was quite a pleasure to record 'Take On Me' and it went like a dream. You can make any song you want by changing the order of the notes in the melody array and the duration of those notes in the duration array. When you buy products through links across our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Sadly, that was a limited-edition synth, but MiniNova users can download those 50 Moroder sounds into their machines now from the Novation website. First Look: Pro Tools | Carbon. 172 notes. BPM. It was after Tarney co‑produced singer‑songwriter Charlie Dore's hit single 'Pilot Of The Airwaves', with the Shadows' Bruce Welch that he began working with Cliff Richard. The verse’s vocal melody is the same, too, but the chorus feels weirdly anticlimactic after so many years of hearing Harket doing the “Take On Me” falsetto. This is different than other HTML5 pianos in that it doesn't use pre-recorded audio files, and that it's a little bit more refined. I just added some reverb from the Lexicon 224, as well as repeat echo for the high falsetto bits and that was it.”, "Morten had an exceptional voice with a quite amazing range,” Tarney agrees. I've watched this video a number of times but it's grainey and the shots are short. "More than a year earlier, I had actually been approached by Warner Brothers and A‑ha's manager Terry Slater to do the whole album,” Tarney says. Take On Me by A-Ha Take On Me Sheet music for Piano, Guitar, Contrabass, Synthesizer | Download free in PDF or MIDI | Musescore.com All rights belong to a-ha and their record labels. 23 notes. So I told Terry Slater this and, at that point, he brought in Tony Mansfield. "We very quickly saw how important it is to have a record company behind you. 23 notes. The way he sang was pretty dynamic. Just a friendly reminder that political discussion, (including "offhand" and 'sideways' commenting) is. Hall Of Fame The Script advanced. Thanks to the David Cassidy project, we couldn't afford to give it any more time.”. A‑ha, 1985. This was in marked contrast to the piecemeal approach taken at Eel Pie. Notes: - You really need two guitars, one for the chords and one for the various riffs, but if youre singing then you can leave the riffs out and concentrate on the chords. He just sang the song and accepted what we considered to be the master. Title. They had reached the limit of their budget, but Warners wanted the song to sound the best it possibly could, and they were willing to go over‑budget to get it right. "I was still using the Linn in conjunction with my UMI,” Tarney continues. As recorded by Neill King, 'Take On Me' was eventually released as a single in October 1984, and, promoted by a straightforward, relatively unimaginative video of the band performing the number against a blue background, sold just 300 copies worldwide while peaking at number 137 on the UK chart. I did that every day and I eventually became very adept at making records. Instrument. "Being that RG Jones was still 24‑track (soon after, we got a digital Mitsubishi 32‑track), we normally had to start by getting some sort of drum track down. During their teen years, Tarney and Britten played guitar in separate bands, and after each returned to the UK in the late '60s, they met up in London and formed a band named Quartet. What's more, if I was at RG Jones I'd still be thinking of musical things to add. Contains printable sheet music plus an interactive, downloadable digital sheet music file. A‑ha, 1985. "For some reason, after it had been agreed that I would produce the album, it turned out I couldn't do it. Note the better drummer! "Normally, when it came to his productions Alan was a bit of a one‑man band and he would program his own drums, but PÃ¥l was amazing. The contents of this article are subject to worldwide copyright protection and reproduction in whole or part, whether mechanical or electronic, is expressly forbidden without the prior written consent of the Publishers. Still, as at that studio, the console at RG Jones was a 48‑input E-series SSL, while the tape machine was a 24‑track Studer A80. Synth used for A-Ha's Take on Me? The live room at RG Jones from the 1985 brochure. 876 notes. The Roland Juno is used for some synth sounds and also as a controller for Mainstage. Anyone know what synth is used on this tune by a-ha. So it was nice to go somewhere else and just finish it. The Synthfonio - a Musical Instrument for Everyone: I like synthesizers and MIDI controllers, but I’m terrible at playing keyboards. The fine details of his drum programming were brilliant.”, "When they came to RG Jones, my equipment was already there,” adds Tarney. 7 years ago. What is a "hybrid" audio interface anyway? 49 notes. The Synclavier was the first synth that grooved a little more following the first generation of drum machines. I just thought Mayfair had better monitoring for mixing. Set your tempo to around 100 to 110BPM and your arpeggiator to 16th notes. 0. "Alan really had it fairly easy producing that record,” adds Gerry Kitchingham. "It worked for the boys and they loved that idea. A new version was released in 1985 and produced by Alan Tarney for the group's debut studio album Hunting High and Low (1985). They were fresh into the country and they were using the down‑time in that studio, working through the night, as other people were using it during the day. "If anything, Tony Mansfield and Neill King had the harder job because they completely changed it, but all Alan had to do was duplicate the demo, remove the rough edges and tart up the sounds a bit. The first number the two played Harket was 'The Juicy Fruit Song', which they themselves had composed, and with Harket's input this then evolved into 'Lesson One' after the trio relocated to the UK in early 1983. In the foreground is the SSL E‑series console and, behind the glass doors at the back, the Studer tape recorders used on 'Take On Me'. Grid. Classic '80s stuff...”. The control room was the main attraction, and so that's where PÃ¥l and Mags recorded their parts direct.”. "The songs were really interesting and Morten's voice was so different in terms of his delivery. 29th July 2011 #2. That was the one that had all the charm. This is a more difficult front ensemble arrangement meant for more advanced players. ONE BILLION VIEWS on February 17, 2020 📅 “Take On Me” has been remastered in stunning 4K resolution - watch it now! "So it was just a matter of recording it right and putting it together in the best way possible.”. ... a-ha are a Norwegian new wave/synth-pop band. "That was a lovely bonus,” Gerry Kitchingham says. "Take on Me" Sheet Music a-ha, Brooklyn Duo, Kelly Valleau and 19 more. Anyone know what synth is used on this tune by a-ha, Take on Me? The following April, techno buff and synth expert Tony Mansfield was hired to produce what would be A‑ha's debut album, Hunting High & Low, but after six weeks of sessions at Pete Townshend's Eel Pie Recording Studios in Twickenham, South London, the Warner Bros execs weren't happy with the results. I'd say Pål was the main technology guy, and we worked long hours, cranking out the overdubs. "Consequently, we got to meet a lot of artists and, if I wrote songs, I could play these to them.”. I know they originally used a PPG Wave but it looks like they can get a similar sound out of the Waldorf Q in this Video. Since the boys were happy there, we decided to finish it at the same place. Hey there! There's a fine line between a demo and a record, but it's a crucial difference. A-Ha performs an unplugged version of their iconic synth pop classic, Take On Me. "All of the tapes I worked on for 'Take On Me' were from Eel Pie,” King continues, "and they kept a lot of the synth bits from Tony Mansfield's work, but nearly everything else was re‑cut from scratch. Find your perfect arrangement and access a variety of transpositions so you can print and play instantly, anywhere. I like to write music, but for actually playing said music you need to have learnt how to play an instrument. Its ingredients were good — nothing was really wrong, other than it just didn't quite sound like a finished record. It needs to be fat, but slowly beating. I remember them in the control room playing their [PPG] Wave keyboards and it was fantastic hearing them play at the same time. "So, we finished our work on Charlie Dore's album on the Friday and the next day we recorded 'We Don't Talk Anymore' with Cliff.”. That takes time. "Not so much the studio itself. Take on Me digital sheet music. They were so energetic. "After laying down the stereo guide drums, other guides were recorded, including Morten's vocal, and then we started to look at everything a little bit closer. It really is a wonderful record...” Â. So, all of their musical ideas went through my equipment, and that meant I could then control the sounds that were being used and put them together exactly as I wanted them to be. It was a very atmospheric, live recording.”. You see, this only happened after three different versions had been recorded, two of those versions had been released (the second of them twice in the UK) and two completely different videos had been filmed to promote them. "This included a [Roland] Juno 60 that provided the song's main theme and which I still use, as well as a UMI computer system that a friend of mine put together, and which Vince Clark also used. Born in the North-Western English town of Workington in November 1945, Alan Tarney grew up in Adelaide, Australia, where he befriended a Mancunian ex‑pat named Terry Britten, who would later enjoy success as a songwriter for, among others, Tina Turner, Cliff Richard, Olivia Newton‑John, Status Quo and Michael Jackson. Inside Track: Machine Gun Kelly 'Concert For Aliens', Mix Engineer Dean James Barratt | Podcast. "John and I mixed 'The Last Kiss' on the Saturday, and on the Sunday we mixed 'The Sun Always Shines On TV',” Tarney recalls. Indeed, in April 1985 Warner Brothers' head office in LA rushed to release the new version of 'Take On Me'. This is a free Hybrid Piano Lesson by HDpiano. The boys were still fairly new to the studio, so we didn't get any prima donna behaviour — we liked them, they liked us, and they got on with the job and worked quite fast. The original version was produced by Tony Mansfield and remixed by John Ratcliff. Recorded live on June 22 and 23, 2017 at Giske Harbour Hall in Norway. Not surprisingly, Cliff Richard's management then asked Alan Tarney to write more material, and in the course of producing Cliff's next few albums Tarney came to the attention of the people investing time and money in A‑ha, which would eventually land him the job of producer on the Hunting High & Low album. "As a musician, it was just fabulous to play in that control room,” he says. Let’s say that you’ve just heard an extraordinary reharmonization of a hymn that you love and that it made you want to dive into learning how to do this. This all took place while Tarney and Kitchingham were working on 'The Last Kiss', the hit single that Tarney co‑composed with David Cassidy and which he then mixed with John Hudson at Mayfair Studios in northwest London. These were created primarily from scratch largely using the powerful AL-1 virtual analog engine on the Kronos. https://soundcloud.com/kolmaddy/take-on-thoose-notesAudio - fruity loops, new tone. Add Audio Track ... 176 notes. Recommended for you. Then, nine months to a year later, Warner Brothers Records contacted me to say they weren't totally happy with 'Take On Me' and asked if I would consider going into the studio to cut that one single with the band. But in this case, because 'Take On Me' was relatively lightweight, all of the instruments were DI'd, and then we had a few effects of various kinds to go through, whether these were produced by my outboard gear or Alan's. Hooray. The rest of us can quite easily ‘do a Moroder’ with an arpeggiator and bass sound on pretty much any synth. Play popular songs and traditional music with note letters for easy fun beginner instrument practice - great for flute, piccolo, recorder, piano and more. "All of the tapes I worked on for 'Take On Me' were from Eel Pie,” King continues, "and they kept a lot of the synth bits from Tony Mansfield's work, but nearly everything else was re‑cut from scratch.