Metasquares

This is a great solo mix, and although I thought that adding a flute part at 2:20 and continuing would have added a lot to it, I still think it's great as-is.

Quite an amazing remix, showing an impressive command of both choral harmony and production. To those not happy with the quiet dynamic, you can easily change that yourselves using something like Audacity.

Nice work! There's room to continue both themes, perhaps as another movement.

I like it... sounds kind of Baroque, but not exactly what I expected when I saw the description. The harpsichord doesn't stick out, which is good, since it hardly ever does in Baroque orchestral music (seems that it's usually brass or strings, which is how you orchestrated as well - I'm guessing you have lots of experience with this sort of music). The samples could be a bit better, but I was never one to quip over that, since anyone can perform it later on better instruments if you're releasing the sheet music.

Overall, an excellent mix, but something kept irking me about this as a pianist - the balance between bass and treble that most pieces contain is absent for a good portion of this piece. The bass is right up there in your face, and it often drowns out the actual melody, which is being played much softer in the uppermost registers of the instrument. This is OK to emphasize the bass for a few measures, but do it too often and the melody gets drowned out - and most of the expressiveness of the song with it. That may be why people have complained that it sounds somewhat mechanical - lots of dynamics, but only the large crescendos are audible. Most of the subtle dynamic variations (and they are usually more powerful when you can hear them in the melody, not just the accompaniment) that make a piano piece sound more "human" are inaudible, whether or not they're actually present.

...Interesting

I'm a little surprised that this song, out of all on the project, made it here, since some of the others are really fantastic. As for this song, it's decent, and the quality of the samples is good (but then, judging a song by the quality of its samples is nearly as bad as judging a game by its graphical content), but the arrangement just completely loses its energy around halfway through the mix (Around 3:40). The next 10 seconds are positively bombastic, and probably should have been thrown out of the mix. Overall, the first half is good, but the second needs work.

This mix demonstrates considerable talent at arranging and piano playing. The audio quality is impeccable... did you record this live? (and if so, what type of piano were you playing this on so I know what to buy when I get rid of my current one? ) However, this really isn't my style of music... the melody is subdued and lost for most of the song, with too many notes packed together in the beginning and too few at the end. The melody itself broke into chromaticism a little bit too much for my taste as well, considering that the source material sticks to its key almost all of the time. That last chord is fine; it gives the song a reflective quality. It's good; it just isn't the sort of music I listen to.

I heard this back when it was posted to VGMix. I replaced one of the Rise of Nations tracks with this, since it just seemed more appropriate

I really like the woodwind arpeggios at the beginning. Very nice harmonization at 1:18, though I would have been a bit more daring with the harmonization from the very start (but then, that's a individual stylistic issue). The song lost a lot of its momentum at around 2:07. Some of that came back with the choral sound about 20 seconds later, but you didn't sustain it long enough. 3:18 went nice, but that could stand to be longer too. In short, I would try varying the harmony more and extend some parts that can go places, like the one at 3:18. Nice nonetheless; I'd give this a 70/100 if I had to rate it numerically.

I was awestruck the first time I heard this. The entire Artifact of Power series is part of my collection. You may all be interested to know that this is one of a collection of four songs, all of which are on VGMix: http://www.vgmix.com/song_view.php?song_id=455 http://www.vgmix.com/song_view.php?song_id=620 http://www.vgmix.com/song_view.php?song_id=942 http://www.vgmix.com/song_view.php?song_id=1009

Wow, this thing got a lot better since it was a WIP.

Blak_Omen's right, it puts the forte in pianoforte I'd never play like this, but it is certainly an interesting concept and a nice mix.

If you'd like, I'll send it to you - it was a pain to find. PM me if interested. Anyway, does anyone know of any good free GM soundfonts? I'm looking specifically for one to use with a softsynth (Fluidsynth), as I don't have a hardware synth on this computer. In particular, I'm looking for one with tuned instruments - some GM soundfonts seem to have particular instruments tuned differently than others, which makes for a very poor rendition when they're heard together.

Very "clean"... I like it, and can't think of anything bad to say about it.