New Undead themed music

[mctom]

Okay the inspiration was now.
This is the alpha version of the entire piece. Enjoy!
I think I'll have to rewrite the last couple of seconds, but maybe not?

I'm also attaching sheet music for the curious of my job.

[Spannerbag]

Okay the inspiration was now.
This is the alpha version of the entire piece. Enjoy!
I think I'll have to rewrite the last couple of seconds, but maybe not?

I'm also attaching sheet music for the curious of my job.

Superb piece, I enjoyed and appreciated your efforts!
My music reading is very rusty but it was fun to play clips and read the score.

Listened to it a couple of times and I still think you have enough ideas there for 2 or 3 separate pieces of music.

Being picky now, these are purely my thoughts and reflect my personal preferences so as ever please take whatever you find of value (if anything) and ignore/discard everything else.
Not going to propose major surgery (I hope, don't mean to) as it's in alpha release.

Initial thoughts:

• First ~47 seconds builds nicely, natural and smooth progression.
• Quick transition #1: new theme breaks in.
  Wondering if might sound better if the strings (or something else) continued playing their thing above the main melody for awhile?
  (But then I'm biased; I really like that embellishment and would be happy to hear it throughout your piece in some way, shape or form!)
• About 1:19 (<30 seconds later) string theme comes in - would've liked to have heard the previous theme a bit longer?
  Doesn't feel to me like it gets time to establish before being swept away by:
• Quick transition #2 at around 1:50 reprises opening melody - very enjoyable and effective IMHO.
  Liked the slightly less prominent (but still there) violins and good use of choral touches.
  Again, could've listened to more than ~30 seconds of this.
• 02:21 Second violin solo: to me, sounds a bit "thin" after the earlier more "muscular" arrangements?
  Not the melody, just the number of instruments playing...?
  Hmm... after more listenings I'm conflicted.
  Solo is a quite long 40+ seconds making it perhaps less a brief interlude and more a primary thematic element?
  Or I could just be talking pretentious nonsense...
• Last 10 seconds feel bolted-on, maybe a huge violin and/or brass glissando with maybe chorals to crescendo up to it would be interesting?
  I like the idea of a final flourish and think ideally it could reference again the intro/01:50 theme?

For me anyway you've packed a lot into just over 3 minutes and I'd just like to hear more of each separate part.

I'm interested to understand your approach/process when composing a piece specifically for Wesnoth.
Do you begin with that in mind from the start or develop something that sounds good in it's own right and then adapt for Wesnoth?
Just curious.

Again, a great piece of work!

Cheers!
-- Spannerbag

[mctom]

Thanks for your continuing support.

This is my first project of this kind and the first journey with MuseScore. I started writing this piece after I reached out to Discord crowd asking what music is needed, and I chose the undead as allegedly it was in demand.
Many ideas were scrapped including the first melody I wrote, but the second one is the main theme now. The outro was the next thing I wrote, hence it fits well to what later became the main theme.
I am still considering your good idea to repurpose some of the scrapped themes as entirely new songs. Skeleton waltz is a valid concept that just didn't fit this piece no matter what I did.

After receiving some comments that this piece doesn't fit the undead (which is a valid opinion) and that it may serve other factions as well, I think I'll settle with a title that doesn't refer specifically to the undead at all.

I will now compile a list of comments I gathered here, on Discord and from my work colleagues, in order of appearing in the piece.

[intro - 0:00 - 0:15]
- Too cheerful

[the army on the horizon (main theme) - 0:15 - 0:46]
No comments?

[day turns into night - 0:47 - 1:18]
- Too long for a song, but okay for a video game soundtrack
- Could use more embellishments
- Too short

[violin solo - 1:19 - 1:49]
- Nice work with background horn at 1:34 - 1:40 (two people mistook it for strings section)

[the battle - 1:50 - 2:21]
- 2:05 crash breaks the pattern of 3 crashes before - either continue the pattern or remove this instance
- Very effective transition
- Too short
- Violins perhaps should be more prominent

[sorrow - 2:22 - 2:36]
- Too lean, not enough instruments

[outro - 2:37 - 3:03]
- 2:47 - apparently the best feature of the melody is right here..
- This should be longer
- Enjoyable

[ending]
- Doesn't fit the outro, may benefit from string/brass/choral link with the outro; Could resemble the main theme more

[Spannerbag]

Thanks for your continuing support.

Personally I'm enjoying listening to your work as it evolves.
Just wish I could make similar progress; had many distractions/issues so have done nowt for best part of a fortnight.


Just my tuppence worth on the compiled comments below:

...I will now compile a list of comments I gathered here, on Discord and from my work colleagues, in order of appearing in the piece.

[intro - 0:00 - 0:15]
- Too cheerful

I understand why some think that but I

1. Don't find it too cheerful: comparatively upbeat perhaps but there's a melancholic aspect (for me anyway) there also.
2. Having somewhere to go, mood-wise, is good; if the piece begins in the depths of misery the piece can only stay at there - or become more cheerful?

Also I didn't spot the "joins" between intro and main theme below, it flowed more or less seamlessly for me.

[the army on the horizon (main theme) - 0:15 - 0:46]
No comments?

That probably means you've got it about right!

[day turns into night - 0:47 - 1:18]
- Too long for a song, but okay for a video game soundtrack
- Could use more embellishments
- Too short

Wesnoth is a bit different to many other games in that it's turn based - with turns taking quite some time - so (IMHO) music tracks can be significantly longer?

[violin solo - 1:19 - 1:49]
- Nice work with background horn at 1:34 - 1:40 (two people mistook it for strings section)

Heh, I suspect speaker quality had an impact here; I listened to your music through the cheap speakers built-in to my computer.
Should really use decent headphones/earpods I suppose, but didn't think of that.
At least I was listening to it as most players (well, me anyway) probably would?

[the battle - 1:50 - 2:21]
- 2:05 crash breaks the pattern of 3 crashes before - either continue the pattern or remove this instance
- Very effective transition
- Too short
- Violins perhaps should be more prominent

Re. the crash comment I suppose that could be interpreted as the battle slowly diminishing as one side begins to prevail?
Depends what effect you want to achieve.

[sorrow - 2:22 - 2:36]
- Too lean, not enough instruments

[outro - 2:37 - 3:03]
- 2:47 - apparently the best feature of the melody is right here..
- This should be longer
- Enjoyable

Again, I lumped these together...

[ending]
- Doesn't fit the outro, may benefit from string/brass/choral link with the outro; Could resemble the main theme more

Tsk. Some people. Never satisfied.

It's interesting to see how you divide your work into separate sections/titles.
I didn't spot them all but now knowing about them did slightly change how I reacted to the music.
Strange.

Anyway, rl calls so have to dash off now.

Good luck making day turns into night longer and shorter.

Cheers!
-- Spannerbag

[Scaramush]

not an expert but I liked it. hope to see it added to the mainline someday

[Dalas120]

This is very nice! I'm currently working on a HttT revision - do you mind if I use it as part of that? CC BY-SA 4.0?

[mctom]

This is very nice! I'm currently working on a HttT revision - do you mind if I use it as part of that? CC BY-SA 4.0?

Sure, but only when I say it's finished. Does that sound reasonable?
The license isn't determined yet, but I believe that what you propose is mandatory for mainlining art to Wesnoth, so I hold nothing against that either.

I'll have another composing session tomorrow.
You may expect it getting longer, hopefully that won't break your vision.

[Dalas120]

Works for me; I'll keep an eye on this thread. Looking forward to hearing the finished version!

[zurvan]

Hello, I've played some Wesnoth yesterday and have been amazed by the quality of the music.
I think your Undead music could be a very nice contribution to the project, it's perfectly in the mood of the other musics.

Generally speaking, I find all the musics in Wesnoth have a very balanced feeling, like they are all using the same sounds and rendering (it's probably not the case, but it's a general feeling). I've tried to compose some orchestral stuff (it far from your level) and I struggled with the soundfonts, using only Open Source projects (tools and sounds).

MuseScore is nice for composing, and at the time there were no MuseSounds, but even with that, in many cases the MuseSounds are not sounding that great and have some flaws.

I've downloaded Sonatina Symphonic Orchestra and I'm using it with Sfizz, it sounds great, but not all the General Midi instruments are covered and it's working differently so I'm a bit confused at the moment.

What have you used for the rendering of your Undead Music? I'm curious. I see you're using MuseScore for the composition.

Do you also know if they used Sonatina Symphonic Orchestra or something else for the other Wesnoth musics?

[mctom]

Hi Zurvan!

Thanks a lot for your opinion. My work on the Undead theme was fruitless lately because I had other things to do.

Unfortunately I don't know almost anything about the currently existing music. Those pieces have different authors and many of them don't have sheet music, which hints that not all of them were composed in MuseScore.

I use MuseScore and a few free soundfonts "MuseSounds" from MuseHub:
https://www.musehub.com/muse-sounds

For the final mix I'm going to export all audio tracks separately and mix them in Ardour.

[zurvan]

thank you for your answer. I suppose your work is going to be integrated into Wesnoth when it will be finished, congratulations!
It's great to know it's possible to achieve such good sounds with the free soundfonts from the MuseHub, I'll definitely try them again!

[Celtic_Minstrel]

So, I can't speak for how suitable this is for undead specifically, but I think it could be used for any number of dramatic scenes, and it does seem like it fits in with the other Wesnoth music. Would be good for it to have a title, but it's not strictly required.

[mctom]

Thanks for your feedback.

I know it's been dragging on since forever, but at the beginning of this year I have finally exported tracks from MuseScore and currently trying to mix them in Ardour.
Since I have no professional audio equipment, my only good chance of succeeding is to try and get a similar sound to the existing Wesnoth tracks.

I'm also on a lookout for a sound engineer for hire, to mix it for me and get it over with, before we all forget about it.

EDIT: So, to whom should I speak about submitting it into mainline? I'd like to do that before I pay for mastering this track. It didn't see any major composition changes since the last mp3 I posted.

[mentos987]

EDIT: So, to whom should I speak about submitting it into mainline?

Any dev would do. But I think Dalas (Dalas120) would be the closest to what you are looking for.

Edit. I just listened to the track again, last did it a year ago, and I love it. Best Wesnoth track, no notes

[Celtic_Minstrel]

Agreed, Dalas is probably the best person to talk to about this. Anyone else listed as the current maintainer of a campaign could also be worth contacting, potentially. It's easier to accept a track that already has a place for it to be used.