Music Competition: Song of the Elders

[Ekki]

Yeah, I'm really hoping I can take part of this competition! (you know, RL stuff...)
So I'll see what comes to mind

Oh yea. time to play with my guitar >

Yay! Let there be rock  8)

[Bieber4Ever98]

Very tough competition. It's not easy as it looks. 

[BetaParticle]

would a midi composer work?

[jmizzle7]

would a midi composer work?

That depends on the quality of the virtual instruments used, but yes, composing completely in MIDI is quite possible, if not preferred in some cases.

[Tiko]

Hmm, there's only two songs in elements, the one played as an intro, and the other played at false gods. These are very different from each other.. I'm curious what people think that can fit between the two (and in elements).

[Scaredgirl]

rosegarden musE and linux multimedia studio are all free and got copyright free samples
 but I have not tested any on windows.

I understand what you mean about the samples and loops provided by most free sequencers, but for the sake of this competition, I would hope that nobody would submit a bunch of loops mashed together, regardless of how good the result is.

On the contrary, I think that everyone should be allowed to produce any kind of music using any kind of method they want. In fact, I encourage people to use free software and free loops because if we limit this competition to people playing real instruments, we would get 5-6 submissions.

With our video competitions, the problem has always been that most people lack the skills and/or resources to produce a video. Same thing could easily happen here, which is why it would be a good idea to include some useful links to the first post, to help people get started. Optimal would be a free software that had all the loops/instruments needed.

Even if the final result is crap, the person still has a change to participate in this competition without having played the violin 8 hours a day for the last 12 years. The competition should be more about fun than about some "serious" music production where newbie tracks are laughed at.

[funerallaughter]

I found this lovely thing in my pursuit to figure out what a "MIDI" was: http://anvilstudio.com/

[jmizzle7]

rosegarden musE and linux multimedia studio are all free and got copyright free samples
 but I have not tested any on windows.

I understand what you mean about the samples and loops provided by most free sequencers, but for the sake of this competition, I would hope that nobody would submit a bunch of loops mashed together, regardless of how good the result is.

On the contrary, I think that everyone should be allowed to produce any kind of music using any kind of method they want. In fact, I encourage people to use free software and free loops because if we limit this competition to people playing real instruments, we would get 5-6 submissions.

With our video competitions, the problem has always been that most people lack the skills and/or resources to produce a video. Same thing could easily happen here, which is why it would be a good idea to include some useful links to the first post, to help people get started. Optimal would be a free software that had all the loops/instruments needed.

Even if the final result is crap, the person still has a change to participate in this competition without having played the violin 8 hours a day for the last 12 years. The competition should be more about fun than about some "serious" music production where newbie tracks are laughed at.

You misunderstand what I mean. Free music software (GarageBand, etc.) typically has "sampled" loops of real instruments that one can slap together for a quick result. This mashup may achieve a desired effect/result, but it is hardly original work. These programs also have what are called "virtual instruments" that can be played via MIDI notes to produce sounds. Quite often, these virtual instruments can make some very neat sounds, regardless of one's own musical background. That's the beauty of MIDI - it is played by software and not a person. The difference here is that most virtual instruments can be tweaked to produce customized sound profiles to match what the composer wants, while a sampled loop cannot. This makes composing music with MIDI much more personal and original than sequencing a few loops.

I'm not saying that people can't submit a loop sequence for this competition. I am saying, however, that such a sequence isn't very original (i.e. easy to replicate) and will most likely not win this competition. People should have fun with something like this, but, as with any other form of art, they should also be willing to accept some guidance and/or constructive criticism, not unlike the standard vrt has set with the realm of visual art on our forums.

[az4rel]

rosegarden musE and linux multimedia studio are all free and got copyright free samples
 but I have not tested any on windows.

I understand what you mean about the samples and loops provided by most free sequencers, but for the sake of this competition, I would hope that nobody would submit a bunch of loops mashed together, regardless of how good the result is.

On the contrary, I think that everyone should be allowed to produce any kind of music using any kind of method they want. In fact, I encourage people to use free software and free loops because if we limit this competition to people playing real instruments, we would get 5-6 submissions.

With our video competitions, the problem has always been that most people lack the skills and/or resources to produce a video. Same thing could easily happen here, which is why it would be a good idea to include some useful links to the first post, to help people get started. Optimal would be a free software that had all the loops/instruments needed.

Even if the final result is crap, the person still has a change to participate in this competition without having played the violin 8 hours a day for the last 12 years. The competition should be more about fun than about some "serious" music production where newbie tracks are laughed at.

You misunderstand what I mean. Free music software (GarageBand, etc.) typically has "sampled" loops of real instruments that one can slap together for a quick result. This mashup may achieve a desired effect/result, but it is hardly original work. These programs also have what are called "virtual instruments" that can be played via MIDI notes to produce sounds. Quite often, these virtual instruments can make some very neat sounds, regardless of one's own musical background. That's the beauty of MIDI - it is played by software and not a person. The difference here is that most virtual instruments can be tweaked to produce customized sound profiles to match what the composer wants, while a sampled loop cannot. This makes composing music with MIDI much more personal and original than sequencing a few loops.

I'm not saying that people can't submit a loop sequence for this competition. I am saying, however, that such a sequence isn't very original (i.e. easy to replicate) and will most likely not win this competition. People should have fun with something like this, but, as with any other form of art, they should also be willing to accept some guidance and/or constructive criticism, not unlike the standard vrt has set with the realm of art on our forums.

well lucky me none of these programs has that king of samples. or at least i have not found them.

[jmizzle7]

You are correct. Those three programs don't have pre-recorded loops for use in composition. They do have an interface in which you can write and arrange music, and some/all of them have some kind of built-in instruments that you can use to hear your composition from within the program, with the potential to export to other media. I haven't checked them out thoroughly, so I can't speak to the capabilities of each to export specific file types, but I am assuming there is at least some way to get your composition out of each of those programs as a standalone audio file.

[nilsieboy]

like some people might now, i play the piano since i was a child so this competition is perfect .
to bad my camera is broken atm .

[jmizzle7]

like some people might now, i play the piano since i was a child so this competition is perfect .
to bad my camera is broken atm .

Do you have any kind of simple video editing software? Anything that can sequence audio with any kind of visual (image or video) should be sufficient for production for something that can be uploaded to YouTube.