First arrangement, ever.

[GallenWolf]

http://soundcloud.com/gallenw/silent-night-holy-night

I started on the saxophone about a year ago, and earlier this month finally got logic, and came up with this arrangement for "Silent Night". I thought the mix sounded ok through my headphones, but it is quite dreadful on my laptop speakers. Need to test more on different platforms, I think

Also tested a new microphone position for this recording, close mic'd the sax and it came out very thin A good previous recording was done from 2+ feet away, and that sounded much better. Ah well, live and learn

[Calum]

The electric piano is real muddy to me - i think it gets over shadowed by the bass which is a little to loud to me. Maybe boost the high end of the evp88 or use a quite bright piano sound. It's also because the bass is quite high that it's in the range of the low chords in the evp88. The sax playing and recording sounded pretty good to me - although it's clear that it's the only live instrument (correct if my wrong though) - it sounds like it's in a different place to the other instruments. A really reverb on the master might fix that. Or perhaps rev on the sax as it sounds quite dry. Maybe a little spacialisation might help - might make the evp88 a little more distinct. Sounds like sax (center) bass (centre/little to the right) chords (center) drums (left-ish). It's a strange spatialisation. Consider - sax (center/maybe little to the right or double track hard left & right), bass (center), drums (center), chords (left).

The arrangement was alright - pretty faithful to the original but with a little swing and some melody interpretation. Some of the walking bass notes i felt were a little off. The drum writing was generally pretty good i thought. The ending was a little cheesy but alright

That's all i've got to say really. If I were doing this, i'd probably add another keys (maybe real piano or a pad or something different) track and pan that the opposite side of the electric piano, put the bass down an octave and make it a little less busy and turn it down a little. The drums were generally alright could do with a slightly more present snare - i know it was a brushes kit but i felt like it was kinda just washing away in the background. OK i've probably said more than enough.

P.S. This is a personal thing but try building up huge chords multi-tracking your sax - i've always had a thing with huuuge scrunchy sax chords Obviously you don't have to do this!

[Nonamer]

Your a sax player, and you aren't adding your own twist to the music? Add some soul to that thing, boy! Loosen away from the source, and the ladies (men?) will be throwing their panties at you in no time.

Serious commentary time (though deviation from the source and adding your own twist is not a bad idea):

I must agree with you in that the laptop speakers kill this track, but I listened a second time through some headphones and its okay. However, you cannot control how the listener chooses to hear the piece. If you are going to change anything, take both speakers and headphones into account.

Calum has great ideas. Nuff said.

Another Logic user! I must say that the drums in this piece are pretty awesome. What drum set and/or loops did you use for this piece?

[GallenWolf]

Hi guys! Good morning from the uk!

@Calum: That is a marvelous post, thank you for the feedback. Indeed, only the sax is live, the bass and evp were recorded using my midi keyboard It's interesting the point you bring up about how muddy the evp is, and how the bass is in its place.

Originally the bass was supposed to be an octave lower, I brought it up an octave to "overpower" the evp as I had no idea how to do a proper accompaniment/harmonize with the main line, and decided to just play the main chords, but push the piano down. Will know better next time Good thoughts on the spatial setup as well, I'll have to give that a go

@Nonamer: I must admit improvisation is a skill I am still learning This recording was take 3, though I did overdub one bar as I missed a note Cheers for listening on headphones From what I read, I only mixed but didn't master (no idea how) or test on the laptop speakers, will definitely remember that for future items. Ah, the drums samples I used were Addictive Drums, and the loops from groove monkee. Having a hard time finding 3/4 loops for AD :-/

Thanks remixers! Will work harder