MrMusicalLion's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[::Far Away From Here::]

Great use of Strings.

Oh those Strings are gorgeous. Spectacular execution of emotion :)
The Flutes are slightly too loud and sharp, I think they should have been made slightly quieter, in my mind I imagine that they should be close, yet distant, much like the way that when it is dawn, the birds in the trees seem to be everywhere at once yet nowhere to be seen.

In truth, I would say that the Strings part is worth a 10, the rest of the piece varies in value, the beginning I would say is an 8. The way you introduce instruments is also very well done.

Fiddle around with the volumes of each track, this piece would benefit from a bit of balancing.

Second of all, I feel that there could have been a bit more musical variety, vary the flavours a bit more i.e lead the chord progression down some interesting side paths, add a bit of drama here and there, to provide emotional contrast. You sort of did this at around 2:00 to 2:16.

This piece is very grand and elegant - it sounds to me like it would be a great piece to be played at a 'Fairytale' wedding, for instance.

Also the bass notes at the ending should be a bit more prominent, to provide that 'This is the ultimate conclusion' feeling, a grand summary of the music. A good climax in music rounds up every part of the music that has come before it, in some way, it brings together all the melodies/harmonies/flavours etc as one. I am sure you know this already though, and I am probably just reminding you here ^_^

Well done :)

gOrc responds:

You are giving me some helpful suggestions here and I will remember them creating my next piece. Criticism from a experienced musician is the best I can get, so thank you for that!

[Piano: The Night-time Glow]

Dream-like quality

Hey :)
I think this piece has strong chords and a lot of good ideas.

However the quality of the piano samples etc sets this back quite a bit,
Which I know is no real fault of your own, I expect you have done the best with the software that you have. The software I use, in case you want to use it in future if you get the chance, is Reason 5, with the reason piano refill. If you can get your hands on that, then you'd be a happy chappy I think :)

The last part of this is the best, imho. The slow arpeggio in the left hand with the melody in the right. You captured a lot of emotion in that section.

All in all, good composition, more dynamic variety would benefit this piece greatly, especially in the left hand bass note arpeggios. :)

[<MWA>Moments of Tenderness]

Heart Warming, indeed. :)

Was this an Improvisation? It feels like it is one.. anyway.. I will just review this bit by bit.. forgive me if the review is not spectacular; I'm feeling quite ill right now :( Any critique I give is not intended to be harsh, but instead, I hope it will help you develop. :)

Before I start I'd like to say that your playing style and the feel of this piece of music remind me *Alot* of a piece of music by a composer named Randall Leonard.

Search 'flutterbys 1 by randall leonard' in youtube.. if you want the youtube link, let me know and I will message you it.
Anyways, without further ado..

<Parts that worked very nicely>
00:42-00:50 great depth to the music here.. rich tone, expressive.
01:21-01:31 ^ same as above <- this bit is wonderfully played, I must add.
02:29-02:43 Here the music feels like it's really going somewhere.. it sounds like someone is in a summer meadow, watching the grass sway in the wind.. very beautiful.
02:54-03:13 The right hand here, the melody, it has a very .. heartfelt feeling to it.. almost a longing for someone/something. The left hand could be improved here though, I think.

<Parts that didn't work well or could be improved>
00:00-00:42 .. here, the Left Hand was really basic and I think that the saying 'Less is more' could have been applied for this section.. to get people into the flow of the music I would have played slow chords to begin with in the left hand, and then sped things up by changing to an arpeggio like you did at 00:42.
01:06-01:11 here the chords you used betrayed the feeling of the piece, i.e I really felt like they didn't follow through with the emotional 'direction' you had been moving in from the beginning.
01:51-01:54 again, as above, this sound feels very out of place compared to the rest of the music. It's like having Sugar with Mash, i.e a complete clash of flavours.
02:15-02:19 ^ as above.

To summarize,
Pros: Good sense of dynamics, when the music sounded nice - it sounded *very* nice, nice flow.
Cons: Some parts of the music used chords that really didn't match well with the rest of the piece. Also the Left hand was quite repetitive in places.

:) Hope that helps.. in any way.
I would recommend that you take the parts that I mentioned that were good
[especially 2:29-2:43] and make a new piece using those parts as the initial building blocks to work from :)

Good luck! :D [And well done.. ]

mjattie responds:

Hello MrMusicalLion, first of all I want you to thank you for listening so carefully to my improvisation (yes you were right about that ^^) I don't find this review harsh at all, though, I do not agree with some parts of it. I listened to the song of Randal Leonard and I think it's a really nice song, and I certainly can hear similarities with my song, though I think the feeling is slightly different... I'm not sure how to explain... I think mine is somehow mysterious and his is melancholic.

So let's get started on what I agree about and what I don't agree about:

I agree that the left hand is repetitive from 0:00 to 0:41 and the solution you offer is a very good one.
I do not totally agree that the chords from 1:06 to 1:11 betray the feeling of the piece. I tried to make a variation to the theme, but it was not a very good one, I agree.

I agree that the chords are a bit strange but I think that they do not really clash with the feeling (I actually think they create the feeling or something...). I actually wanted to use those chords, because I was experimenting with them...

Though I thank you a lot for this review! It's certainly nice to hear someone's opinion about it :)

[~MM~ 40 - dark piano demo]

So far so good..

#1 The Bass line to this is superb. Gave me goosebumps. So much power is in those low notes, I can feel it.
#2 The right hand kinda confused the feel of this piece. The reason being that most of the time you wasn't varying the right hand enough.. the part where you started to vary it was at 1:03 where it worked very well.

Try to 'echo' the mood/feel of the bass line, in the right hand too. That's what I feel is the current issue with this piece. Currently the two don't match that well.. it's like putting sugar on your dinner by accident, instead of salt. Very similar but the flavour is far different. I would have a lot less notes playing in the right hand for this piece. I would play a single broken chord and then play the chord as one, i.e if it was a D chord, I would do D, F#, A, followed by the chord altogether.

The reason I say this is because the Bass line leaves me in deep thought - and it works well - but then the accompaniment over the top is trying to make me race off - but truth be told most of the time I am trying to forget/ignore the higher notes and just listening to the bass, that's what really carries this demo so far.

The Bass line reminds me of Beethovens Moonlight Sonata, in some ways. In fact this piece reminds me of that moonlight sonata quite a lot.

Well done indeed. :)

Musical-Memoirs responds:

Moonlight sonata is one of the pieces i love and can play
started learning the piece when i only had a few months piano experience (a little bit stupid because its a way too hard piece, now with around a year experience still shouldn't try such pieces)
but well... even though i never learned it full yet i ended up being able to play the first 2 minutes in a beautiful way
not more then logically that some of my own compositions end up being in the same style XD

i still want to do way more with my right hand to make it better then just repeating the same chord over and over in this piece... sadly im not really skilled yet, so many thing have to wait till i improved at piano playing and composing
but im really happy that the bass notes really do what i intended them doing

hope to get as good as you are, hearing your music makes me wonder how long it will take for me

[Mountains Rest]

Relaxing, although, a bit repetitive.

The part that was a bit repetitive was that instrument melody/riff that begins in the intro.. it is very nice, yet when it's repeated so much I found myself getting bored/irritated by it.

Good parts to this.. the choice of instruments, the feel of the piece, the quality of the samples used, the clarity of sound etc.
Improvements that could be made.. the choir sample was a little off I think. I don't know, it might be worth experimenting with different ones to see what works best. It felt a little bit out of place compared to the rest of the instruments used.

Anyway, I like the calm nature to this piece. I think it would be worth going through it again and expanding that original riff so that it doesn't get so repetitive.

Good luck, well done :)

AndersKlint responds:

Thanks for your helpful advise. I agree with you that the main melody is a bit repetitive. I'll try to add some more progression to it. I'll also experiment with the vocals a little bit, I went lazy on them and used the same notes as the bass. I think I'm going to make the notes for them longer. We'll see.

[The Terminal - Piano]

Lovely - easy to drift off too.

I really like the story and concept behind this piece. I'm listening to it again and again, and each time it feels like one of those 1000 stories is being told..

This is brilliant and I am trying to find a way to say what I want to say without sounding too fussy.. so forgive me if I come off as being pedantic and unsatisfied; I merely feel that there are a slight few creases here and there on this 'Beautiful Musical Fabric' that could been ironed out, so to speak.

I feel that the ending note should have been prolonged a bit more, a linger solitary note that is allowed to tail off.. this to me would have given a distinct feeling of this old man, finally coming to his end.

I feel that the right hand in this piece was very well executed, the dynamics for it were perfect. The left hand, I feel, could have had a bit more dynamic variety, and perhaps even a few more low notes here and there to really bring out the melody, because, I find that when I play a bass note, that it widens the contrast of the sound significantly, making the higher notes stick out even more.

So as you can see really this is brillliant and with a bit of light tweaking here and there, I really feel that the piece would benefit a lot, a bit like polishing a diamond to bring out its shine even more.

Well done :)

[Piano:Song to an Unknown Lover]

Made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside ^_^

Lol sarcasm aside, this piece is quite good. Actually, no it's better than that, it's somewhere between quite good and really good :)

Ok so first of all, good points.. the melody is soothing, suitable to the aim of the piece. You used dynamics well too. It reminds me a lot of the Harvest Moon music, and also some Asian based games that use similar piano music.

This piece reminds me a lot of Pachabel's Canon at the beginning, it's got a similar feel.

Okay, now for what I feel could be worked on. :)
The quality of the piano sample could be a little bit better. It sounds a little bit too artificial.. if you could work on that, this would easily be a 9.

Next up, I feel that the left hand could have been varied a bit more, a lot of the time it was a broken chord that was being played, and yes, you always used a chord that worked, but a useful thing I like to do is to incorporate a counter melody sometimes in the left hand. If you listen to Pachabel's canon and listen to the bass line for that, you'll see what I mean.

To summarize, you got the feel of the piece spot on, the playing is good, the dynamics are nice, the variety of structure is good too.
The samples could be better, and also the left hand accompanying the melody could have been improved, I feel.

Well done and keep them coming :)

Oozles responds:

Woopsie, I was meant to respond to this long ago... :s

Anyways, great review! I knew there was something missing from that middle section, and I will definetly try to make the sounds of the instruments more realistic sounding in further compositions.

I'm glad that you liked it. :D

[Turning Of The Tide]

Emotionally Rich Buildup & Release

Seeing as you reviewed my pieces, I thought it only common courtesy to return such kindness :)

First of all - I love the flute at the end. Oh it's gorgeous. I am speechlessly envious that you have one, and can play it. It has a very haunting feel to it, a brilliant way to end.

I gave a 9 out of 10 - so what can be improved, you might think? Well, when I listen to pieces like this, I sort of get a feel for what would give it more of a 'cutting edge' so-to-speak.

I think at the beginning, if you added in a low, 'wind-like' slightly distorted synth [that plays very low deep notes & fades in gradually] you would add this nice bass layer to the whole piece - it would add a very subtle feel that would work brilliantly I think. It would also set the tone of the piece nicely, since the beginning sort of feels like there is a 'gap' in the bed of sound.

In fact the sort of sound that I mean, is the one that you used from about 2:30 onwards :) [I just noticed that on the 3rd listen through.. xD]

All in all, well done. :)

Rottenbeard responds:

Hi MrMusicalLion, i'm glad that you enjoyed one of my older pieces of music. I do understand what you mean about the intro, this piece was made when I first got into stringing together some orchestral stuff, I basically knew nothing at all about what I was doing and kinda just went with it haha, there are many things i'd change and improve if I were to ever revisit this short track, it was a fun learning experience though, and I appreciate the feedback on it!

As for the flute? Get one! Seriously, Native Indian flutes are incredibly easy to play and are also comparably cheap as far as instruments go (paid $40 for mine I believe off ebay, hand made by a fellow there who makes them for a hobby). They're absolutely beautiful (or) haunting sounding depending on how you play it and what key you buy one in. I believe mine is in the key of D if I recall correctly.
I know absolutely nothing about playing flutes (being primarily a guitarist & drummer) and within the first day of owning one, I was able to play it with relative ease. They're fun, too! :)

Anyways, thanks for the review!

Cheers,
Daniel

[(SA) Space Flight Orchestra]

Delicious :P

Only thing I might have done is put a tiny bit more reverb on the strings. Other than that.. excellent stuff, commendable work indeed!

[dilabor]

Worth a listen :)

Hey, this piece has some interesting stuff to it.
I really liked the change at about 00:53. From there, things got more interesting, definitely.

I think the intro should be worked on a bit, it's a bit sporadic and the piano would sound better if you varied the melody a bit more.

I gave you a 7 because I feel that this was worth listening too but at the same time there is a lot of room for improvement, I think. I don't make this specific style of music myself but I am a pianist and I make piano compositions/improvs and the piano in this would sound a lot better if you developed the melody more.
If you want any ideas how that can be done, message me and I'll try and record a few variations of what could have been done with the melody :) Or have a listen to some of my piano stuff and see how I develop melodies.

GoodLuck =]

aboynamedearth responds:

Thank you for the review! I never really gave the intro much thought. I've always had a difficult time introducing pieces, because I have so much fun with the meat of the songs, you know? I would definitely love to hear what you'd change as well.