Age of Empires III Theme | WIP

[evory]

Hey,

This is basically the Age of Empires III Theme, which is orchestral style music, remixed into... well, orchestral style music. I wanted to try something more challenging, instead of changing it into some far-removed genre and making things a whole lot easier, I tried re-arranging it for orchestra as well. Oh who am I kidding -- I like the music, I like doing orchestral stuff, therefore this popped out.

Well, anyway, the strings audio didn't really export very well (I've no idea why actually; probably due to a lousy soundcard or a lousy computer), but it's a WIP, so I'll fix that later I guess.

About the remix, it's supposed to start off as a prelude to war, before the fighting starts, and then at the end people die and it becomes sad and all. I haven't thought of what will happen after that but yeah, that's basically it.

Anyway, to come to the end of my rant, comments would be greatly appreciated

Remix: http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?2mywg2zokdn

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=VFSTZ0LL

Source:

[evory]

Bump You can't all hate AoE that much

[jabond23]

Well, you've going in the right direction, but i should warn you that doing an orchestral remix of an orchestral song is basically calling it a cover. Nothing wrong with that, unless you plan on submitting it to the judges. They probably won't take kindly to that.

That being said i can continue with the critique. All the instruments sound ok. The percussion sounds decent. I like how the concert drum's bass level stands out. Gives it that heavy feeling. The cymbal hits sound distant. If it were me, i would want them a little louder and maybe a little more up front. You don't want them drowning everything else out though. The strings don't sound too bad. They might be a tad quiet is all. The flute parts are a nice touch and sound too bad. I see what you did on the outro that starts around 2:28 or so. The outro sounds kinda it should be FF7, lol. Anyways, a general point of advice here is to also try doubling certain tracks, ie strings, horns, and the such, and then pan each one opposite each other at a different percentage. Try the strings at 85% panned and the horns 75% panned. Or just mess around with it til you get a good sound. This will help strengthen the track as a whole.

The last gripe i have with this song is that it sometimes lacks that loudness an orchestra would have. Again, it could be going back to what you said about the soundcard, but that might be the issue. Its also very dry, meaning no real fx anywheres. Try adding some reverb to the strings and orchestra, and maybe a slight delay to the flute parts. Also reverb on the percussion, especially the snare and concert drum, would really help.

Everything sound decently balanced and i think your heading in the right direction with this. I love orchestral stuff so keep at it man.

[DragnBreth]

Sorry. I had listened to this, but I think I mighta' gotten a little distracted before posting.

I like it thus far. I'm no Judge, but I would say it is different enough from the original that it might pass, with some work.

I think jabond23 covered everything really. I'd listen to him. He's been a big help with my own remix. Doubling some of the instruments, bringing out the cymbals a bit, and applying some reverb help a lot.

I also gotta say, I love how the intro almost sounds like 'Lindblum Castle' from Final Fantasy IX. Very nice touch.

Overall, I like this mix a lot. Keep working at it and keep posting here! I wanna hear more!

[Rozovian]

I'm gonna agree that it's different enough from the source to be passable. The arrangement overall is passable imo.

The main problem here is the thin sound, the percussion is particularly exposed (and is normally placed more towards the center of the orchestra). I like the percussion sounds you've used, most of them anyway (snare and cymbals have a certain repetitive-ness to them, you need to vary the samples more, somehow), but the way they're processed leaves them terribly exposed. overall, the sounds are thin but you should be able to phatten them up with EQ and other effects.

More reverb would likely mud this thing up a lot, so instead try a different reverb. I've heard good things about convolution reverbs, dunno what you're using and whether there's any good convolution reverbs available to you (on mac, it's hard to find good, free ones, dunno what you're using).

2:40 in, mechanical tremolo on the flute, you'd do better to have the tremolo routed to the mod wheel or something so you can raise it as appropriate. Same with the volumes in the swells. There's some mechanical qualities in the sequencing of most of the instruments (1:26+ is a prime example), you need to humanize them more, make it more of a performance than a score.

fyi, random inaccuracies like most automatic "humanization" processes produce isn't what I mean by performance. I'm talking about something more intelligent, like what notes, what parts were rushed, which were lagging behind, which were emphasized, which grow stronger or weaker, etc.. The stuff a real performer and/or conductor produces, to the best of your ability.

Arrangement good, production needs work. Keep at it.

[evory]

Haha thanks so much for the comments, especially for the tips on mixing issues, since I'm pretty new to the mixing part of arrangement. As for the tremolo issue, it may be a newb question here, but how do I route the tremolo to the mod wheel instead of using the one from the EWQL samples?

[Rozovian]

I assume you use PLAY for the EWQL instruments, which means I can't really help you, not really having used them enough to tell. Read up on what pitch bend, expression, and mod wheel does to the samples if you can't experiment with them directly, and make the tremolo come in softer, vary in speed, stuff like that - if possible.

[evory]

Yeah I'm using the free EWQL giveaway from some time back, and I can't seem to find a way to change the tremolo -- I think the sample they use is recorded with tremolo already. But yeah thanks, if all fails I'll just try my best with tweaking soundfonts and whatnot.