Score: 6

"The scream at the end made it for me"

submission: Destroing

date: August 19, 2009

Refreshingly horrible. The going more and more out-of-tune as the song progressed was a nice added bonus.

Score: 7

"Not bad..."

submission: 3xOsc

date: June 21, 2009

Actually, this is a nicely catchy tune. I would have given it 8/10 as well, but I took off a point because that going-rapidly--from-left-ear-to-right -ear thing is really annoying when listening to it through headphones. I'd recommend toning that down a little.

Score: 10

"A joy to listen to"

submission: Brahms - Intermezzo in A major

date: March 24, 2009

This is a flawless and very personal interpretation of Brahms. Listening to it once is not enough.

Score: 7

"Fairly good"

submission: <PS> Song of Winds

date: January 14, 2009

It's a fairly good song that is well-played. The sound quality is a little muddy, so that's one area to improve if possible (though I've heard a lot worse). The first and second theme are pretty well developed and along with the playing kept me somewhat interested. It wasn't genius, but it was a nice piece. I did wish for some more variety and deviation from the norm.

Image of 2nd theme (2 mins in): a sparrow flying around.

Score: 8

"This one's interesting"

submission: Mind of Fire Movement 2

date: November 2, 2008

Same comments apply about the bad samples for the voices as before. It takes a lot of work for the listener to imagine the piece as it is "meant" to sound, and I think that a lot of people simply aren't willing to invest the required energy. They get angry at you for making them work and vote "0".

I think this movement is on the whole more interesting and more inventive than the first one. I liked the instrumentations and loved the interesting harmonies, particularly in the middle section. At the same time, it risked becoming a bit too repetitive at times, though it mostly had enough variety.

Score: 7

"Aiii, the sound!"

submission: Mind of Fire Movement 1

date: November 2, 2008

I'm finding it difficult to judge the piece overall, because the bad sound quality by far overshadows it. It must be the voice samples; it wasn't so bad in "Graves of Wales" where it was just orchestral instruments. But these voice samples are very poor and distracting, and frankly I think you should avoid using them in the future...

I did enjoy the last minute and a half or so, I know that much, but I'm not sure either way how I feel about the first part. It was hard to concentrate. There seemed to be some nice things, and also some not-so-nice things, but it's hard to be sure.

I voted a "4" to bring your score up to 2.36, because I think that the score it had was ridiculous. Don't let it get you down. But I think you should eventually start researching something to make your files sound better. Finale's Garritan Orchestra is pretty good (though not perfect). I wonder if there's anything like that for Sibelius?

Score: 8

"I think it sounds good"

submission: (rosemthornz) a 5 to 4 song

date: October 30, 2008

I liked your melodies, harmonies and rhythms. It is a very enjoyable song to listen to. Sometimes I felt like it could have been more interesting if the left hand had been playing some off-rhythm stuff (it did start doing that at 1:05). But it's very nice as it is already.

Score: 8

"What's with the 3 minutes of silence at the end?"

submission: Graves of Wales

date: October 10, 2008

I'd suggest cutting that off and uploading an updated file...

Now, then, on to my review... this is a well-constructed composition. Some thoughts from while I was listening:
-Who the heck is going to be able to play that piano part? That just seems insane to me!..
-The piano is too quiet compared to the rest of the band (by the way, what is the instrumentation?)
-Nice playing with rhythms there - piano seemingly in one meter, the rest on another
-1:30 is pretty inventive. Great use of marimba
-As 1:40 and onward rolls around, it seems to me that those high instruments playing the three repeated notes should be playing different notes already (but with the same rhythm). The underlying harmony has changed, and it's beginning to feel weird.
-1:52, ok, back to theme 1 for a bit...
-2:17, ah, now this is a more interesting theme 2. Nice use of xylophone & marimba to create interesting texture. They go really well with the low brass
-back to theme 1 & a conclusion. Ok, that works. Pretty good ending.

I wouldn't say it sounds circusy, but it is pretty interesting. I especially loved the textures you had in places. It would, of course, sound a lot better if the sounds weren't so obviously MIDI-sounding. There are a few people on Newgrounds who judge based on the underlying composition (I try to, because I have the same problem myself - I don't really know how to work with electronic sound), but most people will base their judgement heavily on how rich and deep-sounding your sound file is. Hence why some really boring and derivative New-Agey stuff that nevertheless has a nice sound gets high scores. And I can't really give much advice either; as I said, I have the same problem (I use Finale 2007, which does have some good audio tools in addition to the scorewriting part of the program, but I have no idea how to fully use them. So my pieces also don't sound as good as they could. And there are a number that I haven't uploaded yet because I'm not happy with how Finale's making them sound).

Score: 8

"It builds up nicely."

submission: Fat Man Jacob

date: October 4, 2008

This is a fairly good composition for beginners. I think the low rating here is probably largely to the somewhat mediocre sound quality. I especially liked the last few minutes where the structure becomes quite complex. One basic problem I foresee is that students are going to be confused by the 3-on-4 rhythms that you have here. I've been in a beginner band before, and I remember well what it ends up sounding like when somebody tries to do something smart with rhythms...

P.S. I'm guessing you use Finale or Sibelius to write these submissions? You can increase the volume of your files with a free program called "audacity" (it can do a lot of other things, but increasing the volume is fairly simple).

Score: 8

"Very promising, though a bit repetitive"

submission: Chrysanthemum

date: October 4, 2008

You did some nice things here, although I also felt that there were some passages that you repeated too many times (for example, the crescendo followed by complete silence). It's usually best to have some surprises in such things, to keep the listener interested. I kept wishing for more variety; for example, for the constant background 16ths to eventually evolve into a distinct theme of their own, or for the 16ths to disappear suddenly, leaving the melodies on top without a rug under them for a time.

It's quite good overall, but it could have been expanded (not length-wise, content-wise).