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  • Need feedback on a new piece...

    Any comments, tips, advice, etc would be most welcome.

    The piece is called "March on Mordor" and was inspired by J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings"

    Instrumentation: Brass and Percussion (Opus 1)
    SIR reverb

    Here are excerpts...

    http://www.musicforthesoul.net/JonathanPeters_MarchOnMordorpreview_SoundsLike_HowardShore.mp3

    thanks

    calaf

    p.s. I know it says SoundsLike_HowardShore when it really doesn't - I just named the MP3 file that way so I would show up on Kazzaa and other places.

  • maybe I should ask for specifics...like how is the reverb? placement of instruments on the stage? Stuff like that...

    sorry I don't have the whole piece to download...its too big and I just ran out of room on my site.

    calaf

  • Is the piece that bad that no one wants to comment on it?

    maybe someone could also comment on the following

    http://www.musicforthesoul.net/JonathanPeters_BeautyBeckons_DonQuixotepreview_SoundsLike_JohnWilliams.mp3

    thanks
    calaf

  • Calaf,

    I'll come back later. I'm sure the others will too as this is what this part of the forum is for. Busy at the moment.

    Later

  • Ok Calaf-orn-I-A!

    Actually, for me, that's not too bad at all. Maybe a little disjointed in places but some good moments in a short extract.

    The only suggestion I would maybe come up with, is the volumes go up and down a bit. Which can be a little surprising when listening through headphones. Generally there's as much reverb as is probably necessary, especially as you're using fanfare type brass structures.

    Maybe a little extra orchestration, i.e maybe some brass a little lower registered to give it more depth, ergo, impact. Or members of the Woodwind section - a la Bassoons for instance.

    It's difficult to judge precisely, when it is only a small section, but I understand it's a website issue, so there it is.

    If you are writing material for say, examples of your work for starting off a career in commercial writing, the only other thing I would suggest would maybe give pieces a beginning, a middle and an end - even if they are avant-guard or ambient, for example. In other words, a recognizable musical structure that has your own particular stamp. Not easy, I know, but this is what you may want to strive towards. Try to forget about writers like Howard Shore for the time being I would suggest and just write what comes naturally. [[;)]]

    Anyway, just my 2 cents and good luck with your future career.

    Good post and thank you very much.

    PR

  • Calaf,

    I enjoyed the impassioned melody of the 2nd Don Quixote piece. I'd like to hear the whole piece. The 1st March on Mordor piece is too excerpted for me to form any intelligent opinion about. I would suggest posting a more complete selection of your work.

    Best,

    Jay

  • Thank you for your comments Paul. I really appreciate input from someone. Its good to hear that the reverb is ok - that's what I was mostly concerned about. As for the volume changes - I cross fade my clips in all my excerpts. Good suggestion about beginning-middle-end...it never accoured to me how that could help!

    And Jay, thanks for the kind words about Don Quixote in America. I'm looking into getting more MB for my web site soon so people can hear more.

    calaf

    p.s. Howard Shore didn't inspire the piece - the books did. What I wrote is who I am. [:)]

  • I tried to download this but it got hung up. Do you have some of your own stuff instead of "sounds like this" and "sounds like that" ?

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    @William said:

    I tried to download this but it got hung up. Do you have some of your own stuff instead of "sounds like this" and "sounds like that" ?


    Not sure what you mean by "own stuff"...this is all my own stuff. Everything on my site is my own stuff...

    calaf

  • Calaf, this is just an opinion (I'm no expert composer or anything), but it sounds like your song is uncontrolled. It sounds as if everything is just doing their own thing at once, and you have no major harmony to it, just the melody played by different instruments. Plus, you should NEVER end a song fading out, especially leaving it on a VII chord heh. Good luck [:)].

    -Omega

  • These sound interesting, but I wish they were in more complete versions. They are extremely short, and hard to get a feel for. Can you post these as complete pieces?

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    @Omega said:

    Calaf, this is just an opinion (I'm no expert composer or anything), but it sounds like your song is uncontrolled. It sounds as if everything is just doing their own thing at once, and you have no major harmony to it, just the melody played by different instruments. Plus, you should NEVER end a song fading out, especially leaving it on a VII chord heh. Good luck [[:)]].

    -Omega


    First of all - like I've mention many times already - these are excerpts...thus the fades.

    Second of all the part you mention about "melody played by different instruments"...thats what is known as a fugue. [[:)]] It is just the opposite of uncontrolled. It is very organized.


    William, I wish I could post the entire thing but as I said before I ran out of memory for my web site. I did send it in to VSL for a possible user demo but they are super busy right now with MIR, etc...so we'll see.

    calaf

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    @Another User said:

    Originally posted by calaf
    Second of all the part you mention about "melody played by different instruments"...thats what is known as a fugue. It is just the opposite of uncontrolled. It is very organized.

    Like I said, just an opinion. I mean, I'm no expert or anything, dont get me wrong. I dont listen to a lot of fugues (obviously, heh). What I meant by no control is just that fact that I had trouble finding structure to it, but then again, I'm not used to listening to fugues, so I suppose I'm not much help, hehe. Well good luck! [[:)]]

  • PaulP Paul moved this topic from Orchestration & Composition on