Cutie Mark Compilation! Musical interpretation.

[DrReprise 172]

Hey everyone, I just got done composing and putting together a medley of Cutie Mark Crusader songs, I hope you all like it!

 

Song order: Perfect Stallion

CMC Theme

Part of Hearts as Strong as Horses

 

I can't wait to make more of these mashups, anyone interested in helping?

[DrReprise 172]

What do you guys think? Any suggestions or recommendations?

[Ponylectric Machine 11]

Sounds pretty good, I can tell you put a lot of thought into it! I used to mess around with blending electronic music with symphonic music, too, as well as do medleys of songs I liked, so I can see where you're coming from.

 

As for some suggestions, I think there's a few things that need some work. Also, I might be able to be a bit more precise with my suggestions if you let me know what DAW and VSTs you're mainly using for the track.

 

First, the piano and lead synth. It gets a bit out of sync at times, around 1/16th to 1/32th off. I'd sugest using quantization if you're recording midi/vst based piano. Also, do you record the whole piece in one go, or do you record it in segments? I used to record in one go, but I mainly just plot it in notation or record a basic run and prim it up afterwards in the midi now. It makes for a much cleaner song.

 

Second, I'd suggest getting better drum samples. There's a bunch of nice free ones floating around on the web, and there are also nice ones you can either pay for or pirate. If you're going to pirate, I'd suggest Vengeance samples because they basically stole them from other artists anyway, but they are still usually decent if you mess around with them. If you're inclined to pay for samples, I'd suggest going with a VST like Toontrack's Superior Drummer or Steven Slate Drums 4. I personally haven't tried them, but I've heard great things about them. Also, make sure to record each individual drum track (ie cymbals, kicks, snares, hi hats, etc) and place them back into the track (make sure to mute the midi drum tracks after doing so). Then you'll want to add reverb to those audio tracks. A little goes a long way, so listen to each individually as you tweak the reverb, then again with the rest of the instruments. Reverb brings a lot of character and real-ness to the drums.

 

Thrid, mistakes. Everybody makes mistakes. And in a live setting, they're inevitable. When you're recording, however, it should be as near perfect as possible. With midi you can go through and fix 'em. It might take a while, but it'll be worth it. If it's a part like at the end of your mix where the notes are played in a way that it'd be hard or maybe even impossible to edit their notation and keep the effect in midi, open up multiple tracks, record the part multiple times, and if one isn't perfect, arrange the best pieces with cut/copy/paste until you can frankenstien one together. That said, a little bit of being out of time won't hurt if you're less than 1/32th off beat; in fact, it can make it sound more natural. Some DAWs like Ableton have a way to slightly simulate that to make instruments feel less artificial. A good rule of thumb is that you should feel it rather than hear it.

 

Fourth, after The Perfect Stallion, the strings are barely noticible. It's most likely because they are competing for space with all the other instruments, which, for the most part, all happen to be in the same frequency range. It sounds like the strings are mostly centered, but strings are typically a very powerful effect due to the number of instruments necessary, so try emulating that by using stereo widening on them. Your DAW probably has a stereo widening plugin, and if not, there are lots of free ones floating around on the net. This will make them feel more like they are enveloping the listener rather than being a sound in the background. It's also a good idea to layer string sounds. If your program offers groups of different string instruments, like violins, violas, cellos, contrabasses, etc., try building the string arangement with each group, and if it still doesn't sound whole or coheisive enough, you can top it off with a layer of a whole ensemble. You can pan some of the middle sections/instruments, like the cello and viola, but keep the top and bottom centered and very wide.

 

Hope I helped!

[DrReprise 172]

Sounds pretty good, I can tell you put a lot of thought into it! I used to mess around with blending electronic music with symphonic music, too, as well as do medleys of songs I liked, so I can see where you're coming from.

 

As for some suggestions, I think there's a few things that need some work. Also, I might be able to be a bit more precise with my suggestions if you let me know what DAW and VSTs you're mainly using for the track.

 

First, the piano and lead synth. It gets a bit out of sync at times, around 1/16th to 1/32th off. I'd sugest using quantization if you're recording midi/vst based piano. Also, do you record the whole piece in one go, or do you record it in segments? I used to record in one go, but I mainly just plot it in notation or record a basic run and prim it up afterwards in the midi now. It makes for a much cleaner song.

 

Second, I'd suggest getting better drum samples. There's a bunch of nice free ones floating around on the web, and there are also nice ones you can either pay for or pirate. If you're going to pirate, I'd suggest Vengeance samples because they basically stole them from other artists anyway, but they are still usually decent if you mess around with them. If you're inclined to pay for samples, I'd suggest going with a VST like Toontrack's Superior Drummer or Steven Slate Drums 4. I personally haven't tried them, but I've heard great things about them. Also, make sure to record each individual drum track (ie cymbals, kicks, snares, hi hats, etc) and place them back into the track (make sure to mute the midi drum tracks after doing so). Then you'll want to add reverb to those audio tracks. A little goes a long way, so listen to each individually as you tweak the reverb, then again with the rest of the instruments. Reverb brings a lot of character and real-ness to the drums.

 

Thrid, mistakes. Everybody makes mistakes. And in a live setting, they're inevitable. When you're recording, however, it should be as near perfect as possible. With midi you can go through and fix 'em. It might take a while, but it'll be worth it. If it's a part like at the end of your mix where the notes are played in a way that it'd be hard or maybe even impossible to edit their notation and keep the effect in midi, open up multiple tracks, record the part multiple times, and if one isn't perfect, arrange the best pieces with cut/copy/paste until you can frankenstien one together. That said, a little bit of being out of time won't hurt if you're less than 1/32th off beat; in fact, it can make it sound more natural. Some DAWs like Ableton have a way to slightly simulate that to make instruments feel less artificial. A good rule of thumb is that you should feel it rather than hear it.

 

Fourth, after The Perfect Stallion, the strings are barely noticible. It's most likely because they are competing for space with all the other instruments, which, for the most part, all happen to be in the same frequency range. It sounds like the strings are mostly centered, but strings are typically a very powerful effect due to the number of instruments necessary, so try emulating that by using stereo widening on them. Your DAW probably has a stereo widening plugin, and if not, there are lots of free ones floating around on the net. This will make them feel more like they are enveloping the listener rather than being a sound in the background. It's also a good idea to layer string sounds. If your program offers groups of different string instruments, like violins, violas, cellos, contrabasses, etc., try building the string arangement with each group, and if it still doesn't sound whole or coheisive enough, you can top it off with a layer of a whole ensemble. You can pan some of the middle sections/instruments, like the cello and viola, but keep the top and bottom centered and very wide.

 

Hope I helped!

 

Hey I really appreciate your response and feedback!

 

I actually recorded the song in its entirety on my iPad, with the help of GarageBand for ipad and my iRig Keys Pro keyboard by Ik multimedia. I used an app/program called sampletank for all of the sounds except for the piano, which I used the iGrand Piano app.

 

I was extremely limited with the ipad version of garage band. I did most of the tracks in one take, as GarageBand for ipad doesn't allow for precise editing. Also I really wished I could have used some quantization to fix the slight misalignment with my playing.

 

My ipad is the only recording software I have, so I tried to make do.

[Ponylectric Machine 11]

No problem! That's pretty impressive for doing that on iOS garageband!    I have that on my iPhone and all I use it for is jotting down melodies before I forget them or making sure I'm singing in the right key because doing anything else is too much of a pain in the butt for me!

 

Yeah, I'm on the older version of it, but if it hasn't changed too much, it lacks the ability to automate or add effect plugins to tracks, so most of my advice couldn't apply to it. However, I think you can still go in and edit the midi (unless it records it as audio; haven't tried using it with other apps as inputs) by double tapping somewhere on the instrument track and tapping edit, which'll let you drag around the notes, but that's probably too much of a hassle on ipad.

[DrReprise 172]

No problem! That's pretty impressive for doing that on iOS garageband!    I have that on my iPhone and all I use it for is jotting down melodies before I forget them or making sure I'm singing in the right key because doing anything else is too much of a pain in the butt for me!

 

Yeah, I'm on the older version of it, but if it hasn't changed too much, it lacks the ability to automate or add effect plugins to tracks, so most of my advice couldn't apply to it. However, I think you can still go in and edit the midi (unless it records it as audio; haven't tried using it with other apps as inputs) by double tapping somewhere on the instrument track and tapping edit, which'll let you drag around the notes, but that's probably too much of a hassle on ipad.

Thank you haha, yea the struggle is real with ios GB. Unfortunately, the keyboard doesn't record to GB as midi. Sampletank, when used as the input, records as actual audio. In order to fix mistakes I either have to try to "Frankenstein" another track together to try to fix the problem, but the only easy way is to completely re record the track, which is inconvenient.

 

I have hopes to someday have a computer with recording possibilities, as well as money to afford one. Bills come first, and for now, GB on iOS does the trick for non professional recording.

[The Professor...8D 823]

You did all that on ios and an ipad no less. That's pretty Darn impressive. hats off too you man. All I had to say was basically this would sound amazing as a more orchestrated piece but, yeah if your on GB more power to you.

[DrReprise 172]

You did all that on ios and an ipad no less. That's pretty Darn impressive. hats off too you man. All I had to say was basically this would sound amazing as a more orchestrated piece but, yeah if your on GB more power to you.

Thanks lol, hopefully someday I will have access to a better recording solution.