Legend of Zelda (Various) - All my friends

[BenEmberley]

Hey everybody - new piece here!

This is an arrangement for full Orchestra, and it's entitled "All my Friends". It contains music from a few different game soundtracks in the LoZ Series, namely the themes of some of the more memorable characters: Saria and Sheik from Ocarina of Time, Midna from Twilight Princess, Linebeck from Phantom Hourglass, and Sidon from Breath of the Wild.

The piece begins with a hazy chord from the strings, over which the melodies of the themes used are played together by the woodwind instruments. The piece is a slow, meditative arrangement, reflecting on the impressions that I (and most others no doubt) have had of the characters whose themes are included in the piece; mysterious for Saria, mournful for Midna, ethereal for Sheik, tragic for Sidon, and a lively end from Linebeck.

 

 

[Gario]

Ah, got a little backlog when it comes to these evaluations - sorry that I left you waiting. Finally got more staff working for us so I'll make sure your tracks get covered.

EVAL

You do know how to make a good orchestral arrangement, I will say. While I'm not familiar with all the themes listed (BotW and Phantom Hourglass, specifically), but when the other themes are present I do catch them, and they blend quite well with one another. Your instrument quality is very good in general, too. I've mentioned your set has tinny brass and string samples that are merely decent. Not under the OCR bar, however, and the humanization does go a long way in getting as much as you can out of them.

The brass (trumpets, specifically) at the end are mixed quite loud. Specifically starting at 8:08 and really standing out at 8:18. Dynamics are great, but at that point the instrument is too bright to comfortably listen to at those levels. At best, I would suggest peaking the trumpets at the levels they're at in 8:08 at 8:17 and move one or two dynamics quieter at 8:08 (from, say, "ff"@8:08 to "f" or "mf"). Decreasing the trumpet levels will also enable you to increase the overall levels of the arrangement by a bit, compensating for the overall lower levels of the arrangement.

I think this has a good shot at passing on the panel regardless, though fixing the levels as mentioned would really cement it. It's a great arrangement, with good orchestration and is well produced, to boot. Either way, I do hope to see it in the inbox soon!