Sanctuary-The Piece

This is a piece I thought of last friday, and since last friday, I have put in about four or five days on work on it.

I wrote this piece thinking of a lost and wary explorer submerged deep within the confines of a dangerous and forbidding jungle. In fact, the explorer is SO lost that he/she has crossed over into another realm entirely, and in that realm exists all sorts of mystical creatures, such as faeries, and sprites that greet him/her as he/she approaches their home within archaic temple ruins supporting gargantuous, ancient trees adjacent majestic waterfalls. As the explorer walks on, he/she finds his/her first "sanctuary" after his/her long, arduous trek through the jungle.

There were a lot of different elements I used to create this scene, such as instrumentation and placement of melody and such, but the thing I most focused on while writing this piece was communication between instruments, as well as restating the melody and varying it.

Anyways, share your thoughts if you please, and Enjoy! :)

P.S. the song is meant to be quite a bit faster, but for some strange reason, when I upload it as a midi, the tempos get screwed up...*sigh* I'm just not good at using technology..

Sanctuary 3.mid

Sanctuary.pdf

around 0:40, the flute part really reminded a lot of Final Fantasy.

I like the harp, is that a harp?

I really enjoyed listening to this. The instruments communicate effectively with each other I believe.

Thank you! :)

Did it? I wasn't actually trying for that this time....But, the music for final fantasy is always phenomenal, so..thanks! ^.^

p.s. yes, that is a harp....i wasn't actually sure about that part, if it was too much or not....but i guess it wasn't..:P

I liked it - it had a really nice flow...but...

- I wouldn't use the Fake Book font for orchestral scores... (my eyes!)

- given that MIDI is, well, MIDI, the dynamics could use more work. I would turn everything down a bit when they first come in, except the double bass and left hand piano. The synth-y strings, celesta, flute and harp seemed too loud relative to each other (i.e. the arpeggios in the harps stood out too much).

-the dotted quarter, eighth, quarter, half rhythm sounds exactly like the

-pizzicato strings can act as an interesting substitute for harp when you're working with crappy MIDI, from my brief experience with it.

But yeah, I liked the flow. Nothing really seemed awkward about the form. As you said, I enjoyed the call and response too, it fit very well with the "fluttering" characteristic. That was the vibe I got.

Nielda, thanks for commenting!

You're right about the Fake Book font, and I'll definitely keep that in consideration next time. And yes the dynamics DO need work, except they don't register whenever I put them in....

Thanks for the suggestion about the pizzicato strings, I'd never thought about that before....:)

laisladelace

A couple of things to think about.

While you are a student, you can purchase many programs and libraries at a discount. Don't graduate and then think about buying things. Borrow a little extra if you can and purchase while the price is cheap.

I have used Finale a little and Sibelius a lot and can tell you that neither program does dynamics very well. You have to force the program to do it by adding extra markings into your scores. These can either be hidden or deleted to print out a proper score.

One of the reasons I now use a DAW is because of dynamics and the ease of getting the correct sounds I want.

Hopefully the school you are going to has some decent samples for your music. Not all schools do. They stress scores more than the finished product, which IMO is behind the times when most music that is heard today in film and TV was never played by a human being. Well that's not exactly true; a human played the keyboards, not the instrument actually being heard.

In my experience, midi is just awful when going out of one program into another. That's why I push people to post mp3's. Once you get to school, you should be able to do that at least.

Ron

Thank you for your opinions, and if you could give any thoughts on the piece if you studied the score or even just listening to the midi (as awful as it may be) I'd be grateful. :)

You have said yourself that the midi is not correct as is, so I will refrain from saying anything about it. I will instead give you a few pointers on the score. Hopefully you will learn all of these things in school.

The order of the instruments in the score as presented is not the standard way it is done. Winds go first, then brass, then percussion, then piano and then finally all of the strings. The way the staves are bracketed is also done in a certain manner.

When any instrument begins to play, the player needs to know the dynamics on that very first note. Whether or not the program you are using plays marked dynamics, you should be putting them in just so that you as the composer know where everyone is at that point. Hairpins are also a must. Music without any, is dead and boring. Swells, even minor ones are what helps to make music more interesting. If you are going to compose using a notation program and want to use that for playback as well, hairpins then become even more important. Just make sure you put dynamic markings on both sides of the hairpin and always overdue it. Notation programs, by default, increase by one marking when using a hairpin. So pp would go to p. That is rarely enough in a notation program to hear a difference. So go from pp to mp or mf. Then you will actually hear an increase. These are the types of markings I was talking about earlier that would either be eliminated or hidden.

The Harp is a crazy instrument to compose for. It takes a lot of study to know what they can and can not do. I am not an expert there, but it looks like this piece is ok. Just keep in mind that there are pedals involved and some things cannot be done easily.

Slurs are another thing that you have got to put in your scores. As a composer, you have to be thinking about every single note that gets played. You need to always be the conductor in your compositions. In notation programs you do that with notation (duh). In DAW's you do that with cc values and placement of notes.

Although it looks like this piece does not need any bowings, make sure you always are putting them in your scores as well.

Is that more like what you were looking for I hope?

Ron

Edit: I do like the piece and think you are talented. Otherwise I would have just said something quick and simple.

I liked it!

Especially the modulations.

Very fitting for the mood and subjects.

It would be nice if someone would run this MIDI thru their system.? :)

M

Rolifer: Thank you for your helpful tips, I did not know how scores were presented usually, I will definitely keep that in mind, and you are right about the articulations and hairpins, it's just I usually do them last, and this IS a rough draft, to get the general idea across so I could hear some suggestions before I revise it for my portfolio.

Thank you for your compliment, and even more for your suggestions! :)

Thank You Michael for your comments as well! ^.^

I found this piece very intimidating because of my dark heart, but the orchestration is very meritable.

I don't understand...? How is this piece intimidating at all? I would appreciate your insight, and thank you for your compliment on the orchestration! :)

It's good! It has a good consistency of mood and a good use of orchestration and melodic rhythm. I would say experiment with color more ;). You have a good base, now maybe try to really mess up the color in the middle so you can keep the listener interested for hours! You don't need to, but I should leave some suggestions! ahaha. Good job!!

Thank you for your comments and suggestions...:P I appreciate it very much! ^.^

We all know how terrible midis are :(

But I think I get your stile, Lacy. This is a very good work, keep it up!

Rolifer: Thank you for your helpful tips, I did not know how scores were presented usually, I will definitely keep that in mind, and you are right about the articulations and hairpins, it's just I usually do them last, and this IS a rough draft, to get the general idea across so I could hear some suggestions before I revise it for my portfolio.

Thank you for your compliment, and even more for your suggestions! :)

Thank You Michael for your comments as well! ^.^

laisladelace

When I started composing and the same applies to most new composers, I always figured I would put in the dynamics and the rest of the markings later, as if they did not need to be in a rough draft. In time you will understand that they are an important aspect of rough drafts. You need to be thinking of everything as you compose.

Imagine you are writing a paper for school. Would you write sentences without punctuation marks and figure you will put them in later? The markings in a score are the same as punctuation marks in sentences. The sooner you understand that, the farther ahead you will be towards becoming a successful composer.

You need to make your rough drafts in music just as you would do a rough draft of a paper.

Almost every new composer has to learn that lesson at some point, but if you really think about it, I think you will see what I mean.

Ron

Graham: Thanks very much! :)

Rolifer: I see what you're saying definitely, and I never DID think about it that way...I'll be sure not to make the same mistake again. Thanks for your constructive criticism! :)

very nice i must say! melody is split up into a lot of different parts, sometimes its hard to tell whats melody and whats harmony! which i like! but you sometimes make the same mistake i make myself,,,which is that you have the strings playing large sections of repeated rhythms, simply held chords. See the violin 1 voice bars 28-80. its very tempting, but it seems to me like at times the string accomps. come as an "after thought" to the melody. also, as nielda said,,, please use a different font for your score! its terribly hard to read! overall,, liked it...well done!

So, a while back someone asked if someone could put this through their system. I was bored today, and really wanted to hear what it would sound like with good samples (sorry, I'm a GM hater too). So here is my mixdown of laisladelace's "Sanctuary". I changed nothing in the midi, just assigned patches to the existing music. I used Philharmonik for the Piano and Celesta, and EWQL Sym. Orch. Gold for the rest. I used solo instrument patches for Violin I, Flute, Clarinet, Horn, and Harp, and ensemble patches for Violin II, and String Bass.

After mixdown, I did a little eq-ing, added some hall reverb, and some little mastering touches.

Anywho, here it is: Sanctuary_EWQL+PMK_mixdown01.mp3 - File Shared from Box.net - Free Online File Storage

Andrew Thank you for putting time into this, and using good samples for this. I love it! :)

It inspires me to continue my editing of this work. Thank you so much! ^.^