Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

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canyouseeitnow
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Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#1 Post by canyouseeitnow »

Simple piano loops and other stuff. Useful for background stuff. Most of the stuff are proof of concepts and are mixed to loop. They're not exactly long renditions.

Use them. They sit in my saved projects unused. Non-commercial use only. Message for questions/details.

https://soundcloud.com/canyouseeitnow

Pieces so far

An Old Friend - That feeling when you meet someone familiar.
Our Considerations - A light conversational piano piece.
Our Convoluted Fate - Two melodies representing two fates that intertwine.
Within this Darkness - An eerie discovery.
A Soft Sweet Lullaby - A lullaby. A lil' bit weird though.
Words Won't Convey - When you can't seem to say what's on your mind. A waltz. (12May13)
A Simple Waltz - what the title says. (16May13)
The Dying Breed - Flowing piano and guitar duet. (16May13)
Eyes Wide Open - Cinematic opening for adventure. (16May13)
The Port is my Home - portly, town song. (16May13)
An Uncertain Truth - another fairly fleshed out opening song. (16May13)

I may be interested in projects.

UpdateLOG:
(16May13) I added some songs I've made a while ago. These are more RPG-ish but they can be useful for stories. I also added some OST stuff that are for listen only.
(15June2014) It's been a while since I updated this thread. I am taking a big break from composing, and moving on towards the art side of games. I got a game coming out called Default Dan that I am doing art direction for. Check it out when it's released. Added some songs. Again, free to use!
Last edited by canyouseeitnow on Sun Jun 15, 2014 11:27 pm, edited 5 times in total.

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#2 Post by Coren »

Your songs are nice! :) What program do you use?

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#3 Post by ViRiX Dreamcore »

Agreed. These are pretty awesome. Nice work.

Our COsideratiosn reminds me of a quiet conversation in a classroom after school or in a park in the summer time.

Yeah the lullaby one is KIND of creepy... maybe because of the bells.
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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#4 Post by canyouseeitnow »

Yes. The lullaby is creep. It's more of a dark lullaby type of thing. If you like manga/anime, it's like, Pandora's Heart.

I use FL Studio 11. The piano sound I use is Addictive Keys. It's a VST plugin that I highly recommend. It is quite affordable too.

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#5 Post by ViRiX Dreamcore »

NICE! Awesome to see another FL user here. I'll check it out.
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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#6 Post by CharlieTheMad256 »

If I can't find a composer/musician, would you mind if I used these for a kentic novel I'm making?

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#7 Post by canyouseeitnow »

No I don't mind. Go ahead.

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#8 Post by CharlieTheMad256 »

Thank you :)

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#9 Post by TerracottaPie »

Okay, I'm a composer myself so excuse me if I start ranting on or anything, that said I aim to give as much constructive critique as I can. Let's get started.

The songs all follow a nice minimalistic approach, which is something I do like, but it's also something that's hard to keep interesting over time. A thirty or sixty second loop will stagnate very quickly when you consider people will be listening to it for extended periods of time in a Visual Novel or a video game, outside of such a setting though, it's not so bad. Personally I'd create longer loops if they're going to be for a visual novel or a game, and if they're short, make them less repetitious. There are various ways you can do this, permutation or retrograding are an easy way to extend a song.

This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but rhythmically the music is relatively stagnant and predictable. The minimalistic style of the songs means that this works in their favour, but if you're writing in a more verbose style you'll want to try throwing in some syncopation or something. 'Our Convulated Fate' has a more interesting rhythmic structure than most of the other songs, so I'd draw inspiration from that. If you're feeling adventurous try out some less common time signatures to aid with keeping the rhythmic aspects more interesting. 5/4 and 7/8 are good examples. Altering the time signature while the song is still in progress is another fun way to keep listeners on their toes, but is harder to pull off well.

The following is more of a pet peeve of mine, but regardless, 'Within This Darkness', while very atmospheric, probably suffers from an issue of tiring very quickly when looped moreso than all of the other songs. Even if you left the tonal aspects of the song the same, a simple filter on the percussion isn't enough to keep it entertaining for very long. As someone whose forte is percussion writing, I'm easily irritated when people just loop a beat. Variety keeps it interesting, repetition keeps it familiar, a good mixture of both is necessary but too much of one or the other is bad for a piece. At the very least have the percussion loop over a 4 or 8 bar segment, not just a 1 bar loop.

To summarise:

The Good:
- Nice use of a minimalistic style
- You capture atmosphere and mood well
- Harmonically stable
- Metering was not limited to 4/4 (When 90% of music is in 4/4 this one gets tiring)

The Bad:
- In terms of a video game soundtrack, the music will stagnate quickly and the loops are too short.
- Melodic contours are rather simple. (Makes all the pieces sound like a lullaby)

It's a nice little assortment of songs, I just threw out whatever critique I could think of as a fellow composer. If it sounds a bit harsh I'm just offering my opinion on what could aid your composing in the future. Keep up the good work.

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#10 Post by canyouseeitnow »

TerracottaPie wrote:Okay, I'm a composer myself so excuse me if I start ranting on or anything, that said I aim to give as much constructive critique as I can. Let's get started.

The songs all follow a nice minimalistic approach, which is something I do like, but it's also something that's hard to keep interesting over time. A thirty or sixty second loop will stagnate very quickly when you consider people will be listening to it for extended periods of time in a Visual Novel or a video game, outside of such a setting though, it's not so bad. Personally I'd create longer loops if they're going to be for a visual novel or a game, and if they're short, make them less repetitious. There are various ways you can do this, permutation or retrograding are an easy way to extend a song.

This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but rhythmically the music is relatively stagnant and predictable. The minimalistic style of the songs means that this works in their favour, but if you're writing in a more verbose style you'll want to try throwing in some syncopation or something. 'Our Convulated Fate' has a more interesting rhythmic structure than most of the other songs, so I'd draw inspiration from that. If you're feeling adventurous try out some less common time signatures to aid with keeping the rhythmic aspects more interesting. 5/4 and 7/8 are good examples. Altering the time signature while the song is still in progress is another fun way to keep listeners on their toes, but is harder to pull off well.

The following is more of a pet peeve of mine, but regardless, 'Within This Darkness', while very atmospheric, probably suffers from an issue of tiring very quickly when looped moreso than all of the other songs. Even if you left the tonal aspects of the song the same, a simple filter on the percussion isn't enough to keep it entertaining for very long. As someone whose forte is percussion writing, I'm easily irritated when people just loop a beat. Variety keeps it interesting, repetition keeps it familiar, a good mixture of both is necessary but too much of one or the other is bad for a piece. At the very least have the percussion loop over a 4 or 8 bar segment, not just a 1 bar loop.

To summarise:

The Good:
- Nice use of a minimalistic style
- You capture atmosphere and mood well
- Harmonically stable
- Metering was not limited to 4/4 (When 90% of music is in 4/4 this one gets tiring)

The Bad:
- In terms of a video game soundtrack, the music will stagnate quickly and the loops are too short.
- Melodic contours are rather simple. (Makes all the pieces sound like a lullaby)

It's a nice little assortment of songs, I just threw out whatever critique I could think of as a fellow composer. If it sounds a bit harsh I'm just offering my opinion on what could aid your composing in the future. Keep up the good work.
Nah. I don't disagree. These are merely proof of concepts. I prefer to work in 4/4 as it's fairly versatile. Sometimes I mix it up by following a 6 bar structure, or 5 bar, but I prefer 4/4. I like making music in the "vernacular" that is simple and straightforward style, something people can easily understand. I don't really care to de-construct my songs, as I make it by ear, I'm not classically train in music theory.

I added some fleshed out songs.

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#11 Post by TerracottaPie »

Well, that's alot more like it. There's still a few predictable rhythmic elements abound, but frankly it can often be difficult to maintain a desired mood when messing with rhythmic elements too much. I honestly probably only care as I'm a ridiculously critical person by nature and furthermore listen to alot of music where the time signature fails to stay consistent from bar to bar :P

I'm sure anybody would be happy to take you on board for a project judging by your work there, I just felt that there aren't often people who can stop by and provide in-depth musical analysis. Honestly I'd take anything I say with a grain-of-salt as most of the time it will be irrelevant to a widespread audience and is more just for personal growth and experimentation as a composer.

That said I look forward to seeing more and wish you well in your endeavours.

Cheers.

P.S. Oh MIDI violin, how I both love and despise thee.

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#12 Post by Lachez »

WOW. Your stuff sounds amazing, there's something about some of the songs that have a certain feel to your style. Your melodies are nice as well. If you'd like to feature any works for my project let me know!

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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#13 Post by Gear »

I'm no musician or anything, but I can say I do love your music. I think nearly any VN maker could make great use of your stuff. Good luck!
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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#14 Post by aphosphene »

Impressive music! Definitely worth taking note for BGM needs. :)
Thank you for sharing them.
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Re: Music Dump: Piano loops and possibly other stuff

#15 Post by canyouseeitnow »

No problems. Hope you guys enjoyed them. They might be of use for someone. As someone who sometimes participates in game projects, I understand the need for good quality tracks without strings attached.

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