Kanthos

FL Studio should be saving its settings by default. Sounds like there's some other problem going on; maybe FL Studio is trying to save settings to the wrong location or the settings are being corrupted? Either way, there's no reason why this should be happening. Maybe try reinstalling FL Studio? Don't really know what to say here, other than letting you know that you're doing things right.

Blizzard started sending patch information ahead of time so that when patch day comes, they don't have everyone hitting the patch server(s) at once, plus you won't have to wait to apply the patch. The patch won't actually be applied until patch day. This possibly means 2.1.0 is coming next Tuesday. Not bad.

Nintendo DS: Puzzle Quest, Mario Kart DS, New Super Mario Bros.

FL Studio wasn't written just for the video game remixing community ImageLine has to prevent their interests from being abused by everyone, not just us.

Latency could be from other sources than just your sound card: your keyboard or the load on your processor could also slow down your output. Were you using ASIO4All for playing back stuff from within a DAW or standalone VSTi's?

I'd recommend one with more keys, if you can afford it, if you're a decent pianist. I occasionally find 61 keys limiting for recording piano parts; 49 keys would drive me nuts. And yes, buy from ZZounds if you're American. Look around, but their prices are the lowest for anything I've looked at. Only too bad they don't ship to Canada

That's because she has proper training and knows how to avoid sounding nasally. The nice thing about classical training, whether for vocals or instruments, is that you can usually switch to any other genre easily except possibly jazz (a friend of mine is a very accomplished violinist and just got her masters, but I had to teach her how to play swing style for a musical in high school, and it took her half the term to get it). Still waiting on my shipment...too bad I live in Canada so it'll probably be slower.

Third on the Axiom. I have a 61 that I managed to get for $240 CDN (probably around $200-$210 US) due to a pricing error at the music store. Even after I pointed it out to them, they still sold it to me for that price.

GP doesn't always print their sources, but they make it pretty clear that Jack Thompson himself is one of their best sources for informing them of his actions. He e-mails GP regularly. The possible legal action against Wendy's was probably e-mailed to GP.

I mentioned this in IRC, but the bass playing reminds me of Stanley Clarke, a jazz/fusion bassist who was most popular in the late 70's playing with Chick Corea's fusion band, Return to Forever. Phenomenal track overall, but the bass is definitely the best part. The lyrics are clever too.

Windows doesn't know how to convert media formats on its own. Although Windows may have said something about converting, what's most likely is that all it managed to do was rename the file and whatever audio player loaded it was smart enough to see a file with .mp3 in the name that contained .m4a contents, and play it back appropriately.

Awesome! Pretty close to the original, but I really like the string sections you added.

I'm confused. You're saying that you don't want another instrumental track now? Or just that you can't picture anything else working but are open to suggestions? And as far as I can remember what was said in the thread, the dynamic variance was a fault of the instrumental track, not the vocals, and that's how I remember the current version from when I listened to it yesterday.

Hey Leah, I have absolutely no expertise in this genre plus I don't know the source tune (I've never played OoT! *gasp*), so I couldn't think of anything to comment on before. I know you've submitted this already, but I'll throw out my few comments anyway. Overall, I love it. Ethnic instruments are cool when used well, and the sitar and percussion don't sound out-of-place in your mix. The chanting is an awesome touch, both for what it is and because you expose the percussion at the same time. I have two comments that might improve the piece, should you wish to do anything more with it. One is the bass: to me (bear in mind that I'm more of a jazz listener), the bass line seems relatively confined and static. I'm not suggesting a walking jazz bass or anything, but you have roughly two octaves of space to use on a bass and to my ear, you don't really get below a B, cutting out half an octave. Reworking the bass part so that you use more of the space will give the tune a stronger low end, which I think the mix needs, and will give you room to make the bass part a bit more exciting. Then again, I'm not knowledgeable about electronic music so maybe that kind of bass part is par for the course. The other thing that would make a difference is a bigger build coming out of the chant section. One thing that would help would be to have the dynamics vary smoothly in volume as you build towards the drum entry; what you have right now is basically three distinct steps in volume: moderate when it's just synth, wind instrument and chanting, louder when you add the second synth 4 bars before the drum entry, and louder still when the drums are back. The other thing that might work is to add another 4 bars before the second synth comes in, and bring the bass in then, and add another 4 bars giving more room for the bass to shine and letting you bring in the second synth at a quieter volume and build it to where it is before the drum entry. Building anticipation in the listener isn't a bad thing, as long as it's not excessive. Make the listener know that everything's going to come back together after a break like that, but keep them guessing a bit on when that will happen instead of giving it to them right away. These are both minor comments though, and I hope this gets accepted as is

6) Not directly. Here is the table of contents for the book. It's oriented towards a beginning musician who knows little to nothing about theory and harmony. I don't recall there being much about rhythm, besides, perhaps, an introduction to the different rhythms. This book isn't intended to teach you how to make a piece, but more to understand the building blocks that you would use to make a piece. If you're having trouble with drum parts, you probably want to get yourself a beginner drummer book, or maybe even something a bit more advanced, that has patterns and fills. A caution though: the majority of beginner drum books are probably oriented towards basic technique (how to do rolls, flams, etc.) and styles like rock and pop. Rhythms and loops are something you'd be more likely to pick up by knowing a bit about basic drumming (have you ever tried to play a drum kit? If possible, try and sit down on one for half an hour with someone who can tell you how to play a basic rock beat) and by listening to a lot of music in your preferred genre and trying to emulate what you hear.

I'd also suggest a bit of EQ as well as adjusting the volume. The low end of your tracks sounds a little bit muddy. It has nothing to do with your playing; it probably has to do with the acoustics of the space you recorded in. It won't take much to clean it up though; the recording was well done. I love the subtle jazz influence on the Wind Scene track, and Corridors of Time is amazing; I'd say it's the best one of the three. These are all really great and I hope to see them accepted soon

Oblivion and Morrowind are my favourites.

I agree with Avaris: you don't need to know a ton, but the basics of theory and harmony will make a huge difference. I added the books just for completeness and because I wasn't sure what exactly you wanted to do with your music. If you're more into electronic stuff at the moment, skip all of them except for the first Benward book (or equivalent; if you find something you think you might like or something that is cheaper than volume 1 of Benward and aren't sure if the material is the same, I'll be happy to take a look at it for you).

Unless you've got an absolutely incredible ear and natural ability with music, expect to have to learn a lot about basic theory. There's really no way to get around it; even if you can make something that sounds kind of good, knowing *why* it works makes a difference and will help you achieve what you want faster than just throwing some notes down in FL Studio and trying to figure out what sounds right (likely arriving at the same thing theory would've told you anyway). 1) I don't know about websites, but one thing you could do is get a free music notation program like Finale Notepad. Listen to a song, write the notes out into Finale, and play them back to see if you're right. You could do the same thing in FL studio; it just depends whether you're comfortable with music notation or would rather think in terms of a piano roll. 2) As far as I know, we don't yet have the technology to convert an audio file into notation. However, there are websites that contain fan-made MIDI versions of game soundtracks (they'd have to be done by ear, using a tool like Finale or FL Studio). 3) Don't try and tackle arrangement, except by ear, unless you understand harmony and basic theory first. Expect to put at least a year into learning this stuff, and that's if you already are comfortable with basic notation and if you put in a lot of work. As for books, I used Music in Theory and in Practice by Bruce Benward and Marilyn Saker for a theory course at school. The first volume is likely all you'd need; I'm not sure if you can buy them separately or not. If you want to work in a more classical style, you'll probably want to consider volume two, as well as getting at least one book on counterpoint (Study of Counterpoint by Johann Fux should be fine, but you'll have to know the theory first). To move into orchestral arrangement, consider Principles of Orchestration by Rimsky-Korsakov or Study of Orchestration by Samuel Adler. If you're not interested in classical or orchestral music, you'll still probably want to know the theory. What other resources you use depend on the genre. I can recommend some books for jazz (although you'll definitely want to be familiar with jazz and work through volume two of Benward), perhaps others can speak to other genres. In all honesty, a lot of the stuff that people mix here isn't done out of any kind of training, besides basic theory and harmony. It's done by understanding the genre they want to make music in and by having a good ear for what works and what doesn't. 4) All you'd really need to get a good-quality recording is a computer and software good enough to do the processing and mixing, a decent audio interface/sound card with a mic input (probably $200-$300) and a half-decent mic like the Shure SM-58, which runs around $100. That's assuming that you don't mind doing the vocal parts one at a time. To record a group of singers at once will cost much more; as a hobbyist, you'd be better off booking studio time than trying to get the gear yourself. 5) As an alternative to a synthesizer guide, try playing with synthesizer presets. Find a preset that's similar to a sound you want, and tweak knobs until you get a better idea of what each one does and how it affects the sound. Good luck to you!

At least in terms of getting a mix accepted to this site. If you want to use low-quality sounds for your own purposes and you're happy with what you've done, by all means go for it. OCRemix doesn't claim to be the definitive authority on game music remixing, simply one site with certain requirements. Pushing the boundaries in different areas (including, as I learned, the length of solos that don't directly quote the source material in a jazz piece) doesn't make you any less musical, it just makes you not fit OCR's standards.

I tried again and got it to download. I don't know why I couldn't before. Bear in mind that I haven't tried to remix in any kind of electronic style yet, so I may be off-base here. I think the arrangement itself is pretty good although you generally don't have much harmony; most of the piece, if not all, is melody in one voice with effects as opposed to harmony. What will probably guarantee rejection is the choice of sounds. Someone else will hopefully be more specific about how you can improve them, but all I can really think to say is that they're pretty low-quality.

Hmm...I don't think Asian strings quite fit the idea of a jazz quartet, and while I'm all for being innovative, I want this mix to be pretty straight ahead.

Why do all the cool people have to go to US meetups? You all need to come to Toronto sometime! That said, my wife and I are saving for a house at the moment, but I'd definitely consider going to a meetup in the northeastern US sometime next year.

Thanks for the feedback! While I certainly appreciate all the people telling me they like the song, it's also nice to have specific suggestions to consider. The way I have the piece at the moment, I haven't been as happy with the flute solo and with the break. The flute solo isn't as well executed as I'd like, and the break sounded much better in my head than it did in FL Studio. I'd thought about a bass solo originally, but went with flute instead, but I'm rethinking that choice now, if only because the bass patch I have is really realistic (listen for the occasional buzz that you'd get out of a real upright bass, in particular when I do an E minor scale ascending on the third repetition of the piano riff in the break. I would, however, want the bass solo first because I don't want the bass soloing over the modulating section like the piano does. Without the bass anchoring that section, the modulations won't make nearly as much sense to the listener. Here's what I'm thinking I'll do to restructure. 1) Cut the flute solo entirely. 2) In the second iteration of the melody at the start and the melody at the end, add a piano line harmonizing a third or sixth under the flute to make that part a bit thicker. 3) Look into adding a bit more piano comping, particularly in the left hand (can you tell I'm right-handed?) There are a few places I can think of that need it. Between 2 and 3, that should probably alleviate Larry and Zircon's sparsity comments. 4) Turn the first chorus of the piano solo into a bass solo. I could still keep the first 3-4 bars and the last two bars of the first chorus of the piano solo, which are basically just comping and are my favourite parts of that chorus. 5) Remove the double-stop section on the bass from the second piano chorus. It leaves a bit of a hole in the solo, which is fine given two choruses of piano solo but not as good with one. Besides, I can do double-stops in the bass solo. 6) Have flute play the melody quietly at the modulating section at the end of the piano solo. 7) Remove the 12-bar break. Replace it with a break quoting World Revolution over a drum solo.

I see where you're coming from too, Zircon. I take comments from non-established remixers saying that my mix would be OCR-worthy with a grain of salt, but apart from that, I guess I was just surprised when I was told yesterday that my mix would likely be rejected largely on account of the genre (since I still believe that while the connection to the source material is strongest when the melody is playing, it never is fully absent except for the 12-bar break I have). That said, I don't think your comments were necessarily wrong either. I've done jazz arrangements of other pieces, whether jazz or not, and have so far approached Black Omen with the same mentality. Before I'd sequenced a note, I had the whole "arrangement" worked out in my head. If this had been a typical jazz setting, I would've written a quick chord chart and lead sheet, where only the melody, chord symbols, and 12-bar break would have been written out explicitly. In a live performance setting, I'd expect, after running the tune a couple times, that a competent jazz quartet would know what to do with it. There wouldn't necessarily be a limit on solos either; while the piano solo was pretty fixed in terms of form, the flute solo could've gone on for more than one chorus. A guitar player decided to sit in? Give him a solo too, no big deal. Not to mention the fact that all instruments would vary their parts a bit each time they played it. OCR, on the other hand, doesn't cater to jazz fans, nor should it. The average unmusical listener probably wants to hear more of the melody than I put in and might get bored with 3.5 minutes of soloing. While I wouldn't say my music is particularly abstract or liberal, I did push the jazz envelope more with the variance in the chords than any jazz currently on the site, with Neskvartetten's Ganon's Temple being the only exception I can think of. While I still think that pushing the envelope isn't a bad thing, and that the connection to the source material shouldn't come out and slap the listener in the face in every song, OCR may not be the best place to do that, at least not now. I really can't see any additional instruments fitting in at the moment except guitar (and I don't trust my sequencing skills enough to make that sound competent or realistic, given that I can't play guitar chords at all), but I have a number of small ways in mind that will emphasize the source material a bit stronger without really changing my vision of the piece. So other than the fact that I spent most of yesterday wondering what I'd done wrong and being freaked out about it (call it first-time remixer jitters, I guess), I'd say a lot of good came out of this. Kudos to Zircon and Larry for classy and helpful responses.