January 27, 201016 yr My first composition. Just a simple song =) Fading Edit: Thanks to SergeOfArniVillage for making a smoother mp3 version.
January 27, 201016 yr Nice work on your 1st composition, Nicrion. I have a lot of to say because there's a lot of different things you can do with your piece. Here are my main critiques about your piece. 1. It feels too rigid 2. The ending is too abrupt 3. What style is it in? 1. Everything lands on the beat. The bass is always on the downbeat. The melody always hits the downbeat as well. These pesky downbeats become a problem because your piece starts to sound like a march. Obviously it's not, but you want to distance yourself from that association as much as possible. Some ways to avoid this? Keep the chord progression but change the bass. You could embellish it, simplify it, change the rhythm. Do something that gets rid of this constant march. With your melody, try adding some syncopations. Spots like 0:14 don't have to be all quarter notes leading to next theme. Change up the rhythm! Here are some ideas that come to mind. <img src="images/bigger.gif" alt="new_window" width="12px" height="12px" /><a href="http://img189.imageshack.us/i/picture2gh.png/" class="link" target="_blank"></a> 2. Throughout the piece, you follow this 4 or 8 bar pattern. It's two chord progressions. At the end, you only do 1. It's ok to surprise people, but in this situation, it feels too soon. Your title's called Fading, not immediate blackness right? What if you added 4 more bars, but changed them slightly to set-up the ending better? 3. What style did you have in mind when you wrote this piece? Pop? Rock? Soundtrack? If you start thinking about the style it could be, you can start adding more details from that style and give your piece a bit more depth and detail. Keep up the good work, Nicrion! Peace on Earth, -John
January 27, 201016 yr I think you have a very well crafted first song here. I agree with what John said above however, I don't necessarily feel that this is a march at all - or has inference of a march. I do think that you need to variate your accompaniment pattern. Make it more interesting!
January 27, 201016 yr Author It's true, I'm having a hard time with accompaniment notes/chords. I don't really think I was thinking of a certain theme. It was more a random moment composition... Thanks a lot for the critiques guys, I can definitely use them!
January 28, 201016 yr Pretty good for a first composition mate. It sounds very heroic and modern. I think if/when you play the piece it would sound much smoother, flowing and with much more triumph which would make it even better. Hope you keep composing :happy:
February 5, 201016 yr Huh, very interesting! I think it does sounds like a sort of march, too: it gives it a subtly "determined" feeling, but it's very subdued and tender, even, in tone overall. And then coupling that with it's rigidity (as Vonge pointed out), it gives it a sort of numb, soulless feeling (but in this case, that's a good thing: it evokes sadness and emotion, not boredom) As though the adversity of whatever it is, is slowing draining the willpower of this song, despite how much it wants to fight...huh. I think the "fading" vibe is basically perfect, except that it doesn't actually die away slowly, but just flat-out dies. To keep with the mood of the song, you may want to consider changing that. Thanks for sharing, very nice first composition! :)
February 6, 201016 yr Author Pretty good for a first composition mate. It sounds very heroic and modern. I think if/when you play the piece it would sound much smoother, flowing and with much more triumph which would make it even better. Hope you keep composing :happy: It does. It's different in this file because it's a midi file. Very glad you liked it ^^ Huh, very interesting! it gives it a subtly "determined" feeling, but it's very subdued and tender, even, in tone overall. And then coupling that with it's rigidity (as Vonge pointed out), it gives it a sort of numb, soulless feeling (but in this case, that's a good thing: it evokes sadness and emotion, not boredom) That was pretty much the feeling behind it when I was writing it. I'm glad it shows through :happy: Thanks for the comments!