*NO* Final Fantasy 7 & 6 "Steeling Hearts"

[Liontamer]

This track came from the second round of Game Set Mash! Compo from the forums, run by Darkesword.

On that particular week Final Fantasy 7 was matched against Final Fantasy 6.

Tifa vs. Forever Rachel.

I started working on this piece very quickly after the sources were revealed and ideas really flowed fast.  That was a good thing because it also happened to be the same week as I was having a major certification exam scheduled so I was also studying a lot.  My plan was to get a barebones piano sketch/structure in place so I could that off to H36T to orchestrate and shape the feeling and color of the piece.  That ended up happening as well, and it came out lovely.  But something in me still wanted to keep it as an expressive solo piano piece.  After that week was over, I went back in and added a lot to the arrangement to make it stand on it's own compared to the compo version.  I extended one of the sections out to hold it's feeling for a longer period, added additional embellishment and interpretation, and even a small cameo of Terra's theme snuck it's way during this time.

The title "Steeling Hearts" is double meaning both with usage of stealing and steeling.  Locke was a thief and therefore the stealing came into play.  Steeling referring to hardening and toughening, exactly what both Tifa and Locke had to do to move on and deal with their situations after trauma.

Solo piano was quite the challenge to undertake.  I hope people will enjoy this!

Source breakdown:

0:00-0:23 Forever Rachel
0:24-0:31 original bridge to next theme
0:32-1:08 Tifa's theme
1:02-1:05 and 1:19-1:22 Mako Reactor intro in the left hand (big octaves)
1:09-1:21 Original material
1:22-1:27  Tifa's theme
1:28-1:58 Forever Rachel
1:59-2:14  Tifa's theme
2:15-2:19 original bridge
2:20-2:38 Forever Rachel
2:39-2:41 Terra's theme cameo
2:42-3:01 Tifa's theme
3:02-3:12 Forever Rachel with some interpretation
3:13-3:19 Tifa's theme

---

Games & Sources:

Final Fantasy 6 - Forever Rachel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWfdEj9jHDM (main source)

Final Fantasy 7 - Tifa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cO_ftxA28Y8 (main source)

Final Fantasy 7 - Mako Reactor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZH6coTxDTo (cameo of the intro only)

Final Fantasy 6 - Terra https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObccgHQdos0 (cameo of the melody)

 

Edited December 19, 2023 by Liontamer
closed decision

[prophetik music]

ff6's soundtrack is so distinct. the entire thing is such a musical, right down to the over-the-top clown as the bad guy, the broad and visually unique cast of characters, and the variety of solo aria-style tracks in the ost.

opening section is a very straightforward adaptation of rachel. the transition into tifa's theme was very smooth, and while i don't particularly care for this piano's upper range tone, the right hand's got some fun harmonic content that's going on under the melody (like at 1:10) that's clearly inspired by tifa's melody. there's a few harmonic ideas that are a little weird (1:17-1:18 jumped out at me). i missed the transition from there into rachel's theme at 1:28 - that was a great dovetail.

there's some noodling between the two themes back and forth for a while. 2:40's time shift was a little unexpected and unsupported. the two lines interweave a bit and it ends with a bit of tifa's theme as an unresolved cadence.

from a technical side - there is very little room sound here and it shows. when the pedal comes up, the note is done and there's nothing that i'm hearing for a tail or for room tone. some more meaningful application of reverb would help a lot, especially with my second issue - the piano tone is very pale from a tonal color perspective. the far right hand really is not a particularly nice tone to listen to, and you use it a lot especially in block octaves. i found it to be less comfortable to listen to as a result. i do think that verb will help smooth out that tone a bit so it's not so sharp and striking. this piano tone would work for, say, the zanarkand arrangement we just got. i can't help but think a warmer piano tone would do wonders for such an emotive set of melodic lines. maybe even some EQing would help...i've never really EQ'd solo piano myself.

overall, i think the arrangement is really solid. there's a few bits and bobs that maybe could have been handled in other ways, but overall the interweaving of the two themes is stellar and really enjoyable. however, this is a solo piano piece, and there's just less there from a technical side to support that. i really want a better application of reverb to pass this. separately and not as critically, i want a warmer piano tone if possible, and if not, then some adjustments made to the arrangement to have less block right hand octaves striking the 7th octave so sharply - maybe using more broken chords or acciaccatura to help provide more context to those notes.

honestly i can see this passing - the arrangement is striking. i really am falling on the side of "this is technically not quite there" and i can't imagine it'd take that much to give it more warmth through room tone, and in turn really increase significantly the overall enjoyability of the arrangement.

 

 

JUST BARELY NO

[Liontamer]

Being glib will make it sound like I hated this. The piano sounds too mechanical and thin, which is a non-starter. The arrangement's cool, and this may pass as is if something like https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR03527 is any indication of the solo piano bar, but I'm never gonna be in favor of it. If this can be reworked for the sampled piano to have a richer tone/more body and more humanized/fluid timing, I'm game. Though the arrangement easily gets it done, now we just need the sound quality side tightened up!

NO (resubmit)

[Chimpazilla]

This arrangement is all kinds of amazing!   It is full of feeling, variation, lovely details and embellishments.  But the piano sample is thin and tinny, and the playing is so gridlocked, mechanical and lacking in dynamics; I have a vision of a player piano rolling along in my mind and that is not good, unless that was the planned concept which I'm sure it was not.  In addition, it seems like this beautiful piece would benefit from being played much more slowly.  That would also help detract from the mechanical feel.  Ideally, the pace of this piece would speed up and slow down, if this is live-played (if it is all sequenced, there isn't much to be done except apply a tempo automation which will 100% not sound natural).

I admit I am not sure if this has been live-played, and I can't see anything about that in the writeup.  It sounds sequenced to me, which is terrible in the case that this WAS live-played.

It seems there has been no mastering applied to this file, and no final limiter.  The wav slams over 0db again and again, peaking at 3.6db, and I hear the unfortunate crunching when it happens.  Needs a final limiter applied, and gently so.

Love the arrangement so much, but the piano and mastering needs to be fixed.

NO (resubmit)

edit 12-19-23 after this closed out:  I'm a fool.  Cubase imported this wav in "musical mode" meaning the file played too fast for me.  How shameful.  That's why I heard it like a player piano, stupidly fast and extra big-ass mechanical.  I still would have voted NO, but not as strongly or obnoxiously as I did above.   I've already apologized to Hemo, but we've been working together on his resub for several hours and the resub is going to blow everyone's doors in, it is so so good.

Edited December 20, 2023 by Chimpazilla