JohnStacy

At the beginning, the electric piano I think could have some panning. My first keyboard was a portable grand piano, and one of the electric piano presets had it oscillating from left to right and it was a pretty neat effect with the tone of the piano, which was similar to what you have at the beginning of the track. You have this lead guitar kind of sound a little bit into the track, I think it's just a tad bright (maybe a midtone sticking out) and it's a tad jarring at first. The swelling guitar that happens is very effective tho, definitely keep going with that.

I'll be there.

Not sure what is needed of artists, but I do consent to having ads on videos with my content both past and future. A bit out there suggestion, maybe add and remove ads in batches depending on need. If costs to keep the site going go up, increase the amount of videos with ads from a pool of people who consent to get the needed amount. If costs go down, do the opposite. Use it as a secondary source of income that varies depending on need. Unless the metrics of $25 per day come from the week when all ads were enabled. Then maybe use the whole pool of people who consent.

My initial thought is that this is way too close to the original. Anytime somebody presents a version of this track I get excited to see what they would do with it. This version, although it uses orchestral sounds, I would not call it an orchestral version, since it doesn't really take advantage of the orchestral idiom. It seems like the original theme was just put note for note into orchestral samples. What I would do: Listen to epic orchestral music. Original music. Listen to compositions by Mahler, Bruckner, or modern film composers. Get a feel for how they write for the orchestra. Have an idea for techniques and colors that generate new moods. For example, your track uses a lot of everybody playing all the time, which loses the effect very quickly. Think about movie scores. If something intense is happening, is the whole orchestra playing the whole 10 minute scene? Or are there moments of low energy, low volume to contrast the big sections? Also think of it from the perspective of a player. If I had to play this track, rehearse this track, it would gradually wear down myself and the other players because playing loud like that the whole time is quite tiring. It also would get very bland really quickly, because even really good musicians can have a difficult time making something out of a part that has an FF dynamic the whole time. Look at the form. You have a verbatim repeat of the form from the original tune. It has the same melodic and harmonic bits as the original in the same order. For something to be epic and orchestral it should have a form and developments that build energy. Imagine a slow beginning. Low energy, even menacing. From that it builds to something huge. Orchestral music builds off the classical orchestral idiom. A lot of colors/gestures/etc that are used in modern orchestral writing usually came from the symphonies, tone poems, and operas of Mahler, Strauss, Bruckner, and Brahms. As well as numerous other composers. If you are going to produce something in that idiom, pay your dues to where the idiom developed from and it will come out much more convincing, and as a result much more effective. I made a post about this particular theme and how it works in arrangement in this thread. Feel free to read up on it there, as I go more into idiom and genre crossing.

Click here to join the discord I help

On the thought of communities who don't have bars, they do have coffee shops. I'm part of a small community that is growing and attempting to establish itself. It will remain unnamed. I'm doing some arranging for them, but mostly just being a brass player recording for people (I guess that describes my involvement in many communities at the moment). They have a bar, kind of, but it's really low. I was used to OCR and the way they did things, came to this new one, and recorded for a guy. I knew I wasn't the only one recording, but what ended up happening in that track was just playing all the recordings as they were sent on top of each other. It sounded very weird because one of them was recorded in a tiny room, and one in a much bigger room. And those differences were really pronounced. There were a few tracks that were this level, and while it wasn't bad, it was very unrefined and unpolished. On the other end, it still is kind of weird that there will be check ins on progress and for the most part, people won't start their tracks until a week or less before deadline, and the end result sounds like they threw it together last minute. However, it will still be sent out. The majority of this community is producing good, well polished content, but there is that lower end that just seems to be winging it constantly and still passing the bar. OCR I don't see as a gated community tho. I see it more as a community that wants to present well polished works of a certain variety. It's not that you have to pass the bar to be considered good, it's more like there's a certain type of production that is wanted.

I think a part of music in general is making the most of what you have. I have samples, I don't use them very much. That's mainly because I don't write orchestral music anymore, and I'm not really interested in doing other things. This is mainly because it's so frustrating that what I can produce with samples isn't as good as what I'm used to hearing performing in orchestras. I hate sampled strings because for the most part soft note = weak mushy attack that can't be used in any context ever. I'm primarily a jazz musician who loves big band stuff. Samples are even worse for that. So I'm going to do a lot of smaller stuff, ie horn only with electronic filters, or small horn ensembles plus rhythm section. Of course I could go into electronic music and all those genres only using synth, but I'm not interested and can't be bothered to learn that beyond what I already know. If I go into those genres I'm going to do it using the horn and effects. Recently I submitted a track to a contest, an album, and the panel. It got put through the panel in a week with a no, and upon reading the reviews, it got rejected because it was repetitive and the drums were plodding and too low quality (I disagree with the drums thing, I've heard much more robotic and plodding drums be accepted in the genre before in other places). But then that opens up the idea that my taste and what sounds good to me is "wrong" since everybody but me seemed to complain about those everywhere I went. Lost that contest, was somewhat lower than 15th place, my general reviews outside of OCR were basically "Um...nice...I guess...drums though?" Or "This was great!" without any suggestions as to what could improve. While everybody else in that contest got stuff like "Your mixing came a little short, although your use of (insert standard jazz instrument/cliche arranging technique) compensated for it well. Maybe consider doing (insert new thing here) to liven up the thing." It basically came out as "Yours was the best last place entry I've ever heard." I was actually very happy with OCR's feedback because it was very specific in the problems I needed to fix to pass the panel. I probably won't resubmit that track. I got so excited that I made a track I thought was really high quality and a great statement of who I was as a musician. It really was far from it and that excitement popped like a bubble when I was one of the few people who thought it was actually a good track. Having two tracks that have been approved, and one that has been rejected, I think the panel is decently fair and when they do say now they always have justification for their answer. OCR isn't the end of the road for music, but I think having these standards have made me more critical in my listening to my own work. It's like the world in a way. Everybody likes my stuff, suddenly I get a client who likes it differently. Am I going to bitch and complain that the client that is paying me has bad taste or am I going to get the job done to satisfy the client?

I get basically all my music work from one of two places, session work and teaching. Teaching is basically irrelevant to what you want to do so I'll leave it out completely. The other thing is session work. At this point I've all but abandoned arranging and composition of music in my career due to factors that make those areas really unattractive to me right now. Generally I just record horn, but I also do stuff on trumpet and trombones as needed. As a result I get a decent amount of work, not enough to survive off of but then again I'm not aiming to survive off that work, and as a result I'm not regularly and actively seeking it out. (most of my time goes to teaching, and that's where my income comes from). Upside is that I get to pick and choose what jobs I take, downside is that it isn't going in the direction I would like yet. But it has led to some fun projects that have been decently successful, and it does add to the resume. I've known of plenty of people who entered the industry as a session musician, then after building that reputation could move on to more of a frontman role in either performance or also arranging/composition. One example is trumpet player Wayne Bergeron who was active as a performer from the early 80s until releasing his first album in like 2002. During this time, however, he established himself as the go to lead trumpet player and recorded on many projects for quite a few big names. By the time he wanted to make his own album, he already knew so many people that he recorded with that finding people to perform on his album was relatively easy, and his reputation as a performer removed the "proving himself" phase of being a solo artist. A lot of music is who you know, and it is no different being a teacher, solo artist, sideman, or composer. If you aren't really well known for anything, then it's really difficult to get known. But if you play guitar/bass/horn/what have you for somebody who has a reputation, then that's a credit on your name. Enough of these credits and people know you from one area or another, and then you can start building a thing. By the time he recorded his album, Bergeron had already had something like 250 credits to his name with big names in the industry, as well as recording on quite a few movie soundtracks. Similarly, Jerry Hey became really popular as an arranger for Quincy Jones, Earth Wind, and Fire, and other names like that. His experience as a trumpet player led to arranging work which opened that door. There are plenty of musicians on youtube that are REALLY great musicians, but they average 50 views a video, and maybe have 10 subscribers. On the other hand, there are some musicians who really aren't that great, but they get 70k views a video and have 20k subscribers. Difference? People know who they are. Other difference? Marketing. Some of the ones with basically no views and no subs are not really sticking out. If there are 1500 guitarists all doing fairly similar metal covers of Megaman music, nobody is going to look through all 1500 of them. A good majority of those will stay in obscurity no matter how good they are. A lot of this may or may not apply to you, but for a question like this, any thoughts given help because of new perspective. As for starting your career as a recording artist, I don't really have many thoughts because I've never tried to do that, and don't forsee it happening in the near future in my own career, so I've never really looked into what it takes exactly.

So I recently submitted a track to multiple places, one competition, an OCR album, and then to the site. I had to finish the track on a tight deadline. I worked hard on it, and was very proud of the end result. I got feedback from the community around the competition and it was overwhelmingly positive and very well received. Thinking it was a nice track I was proud of, I submitted it to OCR. It went through the panel fairly fast. Here is the thread in Judges' Decisions Originally the track was written in Ab major, but then it went a little high in the trumpet part, so I wrote it down in the key of Gb, which was a bad idea, since it made recording quite difficult, but the performances of the brass were not the problem here. The rhythm section parts (piano, bass, drums, and there is a guitar in there but you can't hear it) were generated in band in a box, then edited to fit the track. The piano and bass worked really well, and for all anybody knows so did the guitar. The drums were one of the things that kept getting shot at, which now is something I can't unhear. The other thing was the arrangement, which went on a little while without changes in energy. Here is the track, the version I submitted to all these places. I'm putting this in Workshop as a work in progress to get more feedback on what I can do differently with the arrangement, and what I can do to not have to record everything again. I might just program the drums myself or record them in manually with a midi keyboard, since I now have better drum sounds.

I am a band director at a small town somewhere in Texas (there are about 30 kids in band there). The title sums it up pretty well. If you were in band in middle/high school, etc, what do you wish your director would have done differently? Yelled less, been more strict, played more, anything. I'm just curious, and figured this would be a good thought experiment. If you have a story you connect with your thought, feel free to share.

I'll take Super Mario. Have a thing from Super Mario bros 3 I could do.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets for the gameboy color. That was a really oddly balanced RPG, with the possibility of getting through most of the game rather easily, then suddenly hitting a boss that was absurdly harder than the other bosses up to that point. Then you get to the final area, and you had better hope you were strong enough, or the random encounters would be too much for you, you would run out of items really quickly, and you would have to grind REALLY slowly to be able to beat the game. Worst part was once you got to the final area there was no going back at all, so you couldn't grind on slightly easier enemies. Then the last battle was disproportionately more difficult than every battle before it.

I would like to contribute as a performer (all brass instruments, non brass instruments depending on the circumstance). And also I heard there were voice acting roles? I most likely won't be able to take a track to arrange this time around, but would love to contribute as much as possible!

I just found this project. What is the updated status just out of curiosity?

OH BOY YOU DON'T KNOW HOW EXCITED I AM THAT I SAW THIS WITHIN 8 HOURS OF POSTING CHRISTMAS MUSIC SEASON IS MY FAVORITE SEASON OF THE YEAR PERIOD AND I WAS SAD LAST TIME THAT I DIDN'T EVEN KNOW THIS WAS A THING UNTIL IT WAS TOO LATE TO BE A PART OF IT I'll get back to you soon with what I'm doing for this.

@Ridiculously Garrett Maybe it would be easier if you recorded your performance as midi data? Then we could experiment and find the best sound for each arrangement. I'm not aiming for a specific range of games or eras. I have a slight preference for older games, just because I'm more familiar with them, but not a preference in a way that influences the track selection. If the arrangement is good, I'll take it.

If possible I would like to have something done by the end of next summer (Let's say late July). Once I get an idea of who wants to contribute and whatnot a schedule can be nailed down. Going faster than next summer actually couldn't be out of the question.

Last summer I had much more free time than I had ever had before. As a result I decided I would begin work on a youtube channel producing arrangements and remixes of video game music for (french) horn ensemble. I would write the arrangements, then record both video and audio, do editing, and have a video ready to be released on a regular schedule. Not long after starting, I decided that keeping a regular schedule would be more work than I could do as my free time would quickly run out. Quality was selected over quantity, and I would save these arrangements for future use, possibly on OCR. I wouldn't get involved with the OCR community until December of 2016. My first submitted remix to the site was a success, so I figured out I had found a home here. As a horn player, I've been told by so many people that the horn is a classical instrument, and it is not possible to play in other genres. I then proceeded to play professionally in a jazz ensemble, rock band, funk group, and other non professional ventures in other genres such as a gospel choir and mariachi band. I am not the only horn player who has done this. However, the view that the horn is a strictly classical instrument is still very common, and I believe that it is a very limiting viewpoint. There are many horn players who do not feel they are capable of venturing into new areas because they do not think it is possible, and there are many more who want to venture but are held back by teachers, peers, etc. I was told that I couldn't play jazz, a genre I was raised on, and the horn was literally taken away from me when I tried to play. They told me I ABSOLUTELY HAD TO play on trumpet or trombone, then when my skill level was so much lower than it was on my primary instrument, basically told me that I was no good at jazz. I want to contribute to the solution of this problem. My contribution will be a series of arrangements for horn in many genres. This is where the community comes in. As it stands now, I have 4 arrangements that are complete and awaiting recording, and others that are in various stages of completion. I would like to make a whole disc's worth of music, however I would definitely not object to having two or more. I am looking for collaborators on this project. What is the purpose of this project? The purpose of this project is to produce music with the horn as a central feature. One of the arrangements being recorded is a rock track. There are 8 horn parts, and a collaborator is recording guitar, bass, and drums. I recorded all the horns and programmed piano. The horns do most of the heavy lifting when it comes to presenting themes. The other instruments are primarily support, however they are invaluable for the end product. For a different track, it would be different, such as working with a vocalist. If that were the collaboration, they would be the primary feature, with the horns supporting. I am a little split at the idea of having a solo wind instrument other than horn as a feature, however I am open to suggestion. After producing this, there will be a body of work that can be referenced to say "Yes, the horn can do that, and yes you can do that too!" Or for arrangers, composers, or remixers to see what is possible and create new works inspired by this. What would be needed from a collaborator? There are two ways to contribute; as an arranger or a performer. Arrangement contributors would write the arrangements to be performed. Most of the work would be left to the collaborator, and I would edit minor details as needed for playability or effectiveness. Contributing as a performer could involve arranging as described above and also performance with the voice or another instrument. Performers would be highly encouraged to participate in the arrangement process to highlight their strengths. Non musically, an artist to design artwork for the album would be needed. What genres are possible? Many genres are possible. Due to the nature of the project, some genres are more difficult than others. For example, predominately electronic genres such as EDM or dubstep that are driven by synths would be much more difficult to keep the acoustic horn as a central feature. However, if those genres could be made to feature the acoustic horn I would be more than happy to oblige. I have performance experience in jazz, rock, funk, gospel, mariachi, country, and others, and have worked in even more genres not as a horn player, so gaining familiarity would not be much of a problem. I am looking at the London Horn Sound albums for reference. I am excited to work with people on this project, and am even more excited to see what can be produced!

Musique concrète comes to mind. (Except it's not just limited to game sounds, it is sounds and other things that are used to make music that may or may not be considered music to the listener, but then again a lot of modern art music kind of works like that if you really think about it)

I was initially excited, however I thought for a minute and realized that I don't need one. I already have a supaboy (the handheld SNES), and it can play both SNES and SFC games, most of which you can get pretty cheaply online if you know where to look. My collection is sizable because of this. I can think of three reasons to get this though. 1. This would make a great gift for somebody who is interested in playing the SNES, but doesn't have access to one and doesn't like the idea of an emulator. I can think of a few people that I would give this as a gift to, like my inlaws. 2. Some of the games on here are not cheap in English (a lot of them are, but there are ones that aren't). Earthbound doesn't go for a low price, I've been tracking it somewhat regularly over the last 10 years. Normally I find a decent price on ebay, but the price rises quickly out of my range. I'm not going to spend $100 on one game, no matter how much I want to play it. I can get the SFC (Japanese) version for like 5 for a dollar, so I might do that soon, especially since my Japanese is getting better. This doesn't affect the games on this device for the most part, but it is a nice thought. 3. The battery backup in SNES carts is limited. I've seen projections that they last 20 years, which means that they will start dropping like flies in the near future, but I've also seen projections that they last even longer than that. There is actually a chance that I won't be able to play these games with my kids when they get old enough to enjoy them because saving games wouldn't happen. For some that isn't a problem, but for others like Zelda or Super Metroid that you can't beat in one sitting as a new player it isn't fun. My SNES I got secondhand and it's wearing out. It isn't yellow, but I do have to have a cushion in front of the cart to make it actually turn on, and my controllers are also wearing out. I probably won't buy this for myself, but would definitely gift it to somebody who would be interested.

@Rozovian Would you be willing to tell me more about it, if not on here, maybe in a PM? This sounds very useful.

Remembering the things I did the last time to make my mix sound better. Something doesn't sound right, what can I do? Then it hits me. Do the thing that always works again, because I forgot to do it for the millionth time. Example: This mix sounds very noisy and there isn't much acoustic free space. Why is this? Nothing I do seems to be working! Right. I need to EQ to reduce my mids. And suddenly it fixed everything. Repeat this for basically every mix I do ever.

Not going to lie I was really tired I clicked the youtube link and waited a bunch of loops through the source expecting the hip hop part to come in You have really nice textures going, and then the source melody comes in and sets the scene really well for some rapping to happen. Maybe DetectiveTuesday or Smooth4Lyfe could do some of that. I could see this going with reharmonization as it goes forward. Loop what you have a few times, then gradually introduce new harmonies. You could use the special zone as a B section, or the star road. Maybe use those as a chorus. Continue working!

It does definitely vary from genre to genre, and also background to background. For example, I have one remix posted on the site, and another in the evaluation queue. Both use live instruments almost exclusively. One is jazz, and the other is some other genre that I don't know how to classify. Jazz doesn't really sound right with samples, especially with wind instruments, so it tends to work better with live instruments. As for background, a lot of people on this site are hobbyists who learned music on their own. Using samples or synths is what they know really well, although there is a large number of rock/metal who use live guitar. Many people play guitar as a primary instrument. I'm a classically trained french horn player who also does jazz extensively, so I prefer live instruments because that's what I'm more "fluent" in. If you use what you have, and make it work, you'll fit in just fine!

I used to be a big gamer, but that gradually then suddenly stopped at one point. The most recent game I played all the way through was Twilight Princess in 2006. I occasionally played Smash Bros Brawl on the Wii, but I had to borrow my sister's console, and then when I moved away from home I couldn't take it with me. I occasionally would play my gamecube and earlier games, but even then I was suffering from severe depression and anxiety, so I couldn't play for more than 20-30 minutes a week before I would feel extremely guilty and worthless for not being productive with my time. I eventually got help for that, and was treated for the depression and counseling for coping mechanisms for the anxiety, so things did get better. I never really went back to gaming. Occasionally I would visit my hometown and would play whatever games were more recent on my sister's consoles, but couldn't get into them. I played Metroid Prime 3 and was like...motion controls? What is this? And I couldn't make it past the first 10-15 minutes. Same with Skyward Sword. This last winter break I didn't have anything to do, started to feel burnt out of music, had just graduated college, and was unemployed waiting for places to call me back, so I decided to play through the N64 Zelda games. I played through Ocarina but didn't get through Majora before things started again and I couldn't continue. I'm almost one semester into graduate school and am not going to continue that degree. I'm feeling very burnt out of music and things at the moment, so I'm going in a different direction. I'm going to study japanese, and will play games in that language as I progress. However, I probably won't really try to play catch up with games I missed. I'll do some older ones, maybe some 2010 era ones, but not really many new ones. When it comes down it it, I see everybody playing Undertale and Overwatch and I just am not interested. I used to be a gamer...but not anymore. Not even close.