Really pleased to hear you say "when we do the next one" - unfortunately, I only came across your channel last month (I blame the algorithm) so missed the boat this time around but would love to participate if you do it again. I know you let yourself in for a world of grief when you start judging competitions (I remember the furore when Spitfire did the Westworld one) but please ignore it as it's so valuable for beginners and hobbyists to have a project to work towards, other entrants with the same brief to compare our scores to, and of course some feedback from judges. I know there are lots of us who really appreciate the effort (and it must have been substantial!) that you've put in here. Oh, and the channel is fantastic, by the way - it's quickly become one of my favourites, so thanks for that too!
I do wish these sorts of competitions were broken out by skill level. I hazard the problem is that to make such a thing work, there would have to be a pre-screening process and a lack of announcement that it would be skill-tiered first, to prevent sandbaggers from rigging their scores. :|
@@FormulaXFDdon’t keep yourself from doing a submission just because you don’t think you’ll be a finalist. It’s about growing in your craft and challenging yourself. I just found out about this challenge, and I’ll be doing this first one in 2024 even though I just recently got into making music, and I’m still using all free software. Even if my track isn’t that good, I’ll still learn and get better 😃
Wonderful insight! I went in to the competition confident, but during the live stream was IMMEDIATELY humbled by the skill of the finalists. Definitely a valuable lesson and I was urgently taking notes the entire time. I’m definitely going to enter again after lots and lots of practice. Thanks for the follow up!
People don’t like the synth-based videos??? I was super into those, along with most of the orchestral content. Lots of smart and easily digestible perspectives on how to write and use different tools in the toolkit. Besides, knowledge is power.
Thanks Ryan. That's useful. I had no particular expectations myself, but thought it would be fun to join in and share the experience and then see how what I did compared to what the finalists did for future reference. This sums that up very nicely.
Huh... as a listener it seemed the tracks were universally trying to do too much. To score one picture with no action at all on screen, some of them were incredibly busy, flurries of movement, and I thought the one thing I'd learned is that while there's a staggering amount of skill, craft, tech out there universally we try too hard thinking every piece has to be *the* piece, put everything and the kitchen sink in, etc... Hearing you were actually looking for this, did get a lot of the kind of moody atmosphere tracks most people would think the picture called for and threw them out was a surprise.
Oh wow, I would've loved to participate! Too bad I didn't discover your channel until just last month! So relieved to hear you're going to host another one soon! I'd love to write and submit something, especially since film scoring and video game soundtracks is what I aspire to do professionally with my music! I will be keeping a close eye out for the next competition! Just out of curiosity, what were the prizes?
Uh .... you made a rational and clear explanation of why I started to make a modular generative piece for your contest but ended up with no submission and 2 weird pieces one on PI and the other on whales 🥳 Let's see the next contest. Keep going with your great videos on composition!
Perhaps put a cap on the number of submissions that you accept for next time. That's a lot of listening and extremely difficult to compare that many tracks. Well done. A photographer on UA-cam I follow runs a photo contest that charges an entry fee. All the money raised goes to charity....
Yea good ideas and things to consider. Entry fee, even a small amount for charity, would probably drop the number of entries to 1/4 the amount. A cap like "only the first 500 entries get in" feels like it might cause people to rush to get in. And maybe the novelty has worn off and less people will participate next time. Who knows I guess.
@@RyanLeach Figured it out! When you sign up and pay, you don't have to submit the piece right away. That way no one is rushed....which I agree is a problem you don't want.
I actually stand to learn the most from you about the production, getting a desktop computer for it, and the right libraries and DAW and whatnot to produce a polished track. As musicians it is just a lot less exciting to most of us probably but it's just a necessary matter of work and craft
How are you doing with that? I'm no expert but there are definitely things I would do differently if starting over. No matter what, as long as you keep creating, the learning will be a natural by-product. Good luck with it!
@@johnnymorell4974 I am now studying essentially thoroughbass and improvisation with Nicola Canzano, a brilliant fugue improviser. I hope to build a rock solid foundation in my music fundamentals fluency, my ear, my counterpoint, etc that will serve to bolster my compositions.
@@lerippletoe6893 Sounds like you're in good company. You mentioned a computer and daw. I still find it quite amazing that we can create music anywhere, regardless of living quarters, etc and, relatively, inexpensively. As you said, the technical side (computer, daw, etc) may be a necessary evil and can be a distraction but, obviously, it's one of the prices to pay for the ability to produce oneself. My own notes to a freshly starting out self would be to keep it simple. At the beginning, you fumble around, searching for the best advice from whoever you can find but at some point, you have to take the plunge. I use Reaper, which has a solid community and is well worth the price. It has a notation editor but I can't say how well it works because I can't notate and have no point of reference. I would also tell myself to stick with the vanilla version and learn using the stock plugins before anything else. The amount of options when it comes to sound design can be quite crippling, creatively but the other part of me is glad of the options, especially now I'm starting to focus on each project with a tighter vision of what I'm looking for. Thanks for the response. I hope your experiences take you far away, into the realm of imagination and expression and that you gain a sense of fulfillment throughout your journey. Take care.
@@johnnymorell4974 I have a macbook pro so I have logic pro x with it already. I should start adding in chunks to what I'm doing, it's just hard to do the organizational tasks of getting started in different things without diverting all your momentum. Considering I work, try to exercise enough for health, trying to practice a few hours every day, listen to music sometimes few hours, and then writing and revising music. I think transitioning back to more polished and modern works would make sense after getting this thoroughbass foundation solid now that I have a great teacher. My money goes further the nore work I put into what he guides me to and corrects. I should make room for free creative time for sure though, to get a bank of more orchestration based ideas. Thanks for the feedback, I hope things are going well for you too!
@@lerippletoe6893 Ah, I see. Logic is meant to be solid. It's about using what you have and really getting to know how it works. To be honest, I'm not an orchestral creator, though I do use classical instruments in projects. I don't have a particular style or genre and like to experiment. It changed for me when I entered a competition. It meant a deadline and also allowed me to hear what others were doing. I tried not to listen to too many others' work and a few times along the way decided I probably wasn't good enough, technically, to enter and left it alone for a while. In the end I realised I would always think this way and never push forward, so relaxed and took the competition aspect as a challenge to myself and a simple deadline. The deadline is the most important thing to have in focus. I've never had an issue with creativity but it meant having a building pile is unfinished ideas, which I'd probably never go back to. Again, it hit me that discipline was where I needed to concentrate. I learned so much just by having that deadline. The piece contained a classical build and I discovered I could articulate and manipulate sounds more than I thought was possible. Greater than that though, was the idea of workflow. It's funny but, at the very beginning of my daw journey, there were tips regarding these basics but you tend to overlook those things and start to dive in.. only looking up methods as you go. Then you come full circle and realise it was the truth. I think you have to go through that process to fully comprehend it. I read comments from those who say they're not good enough and I understand where they're coming from but I would say just go for it. There's nothing to lose and everything to gain. It's not about winning a competition but how much you learn from the discipline. It's extremely rewarding and I'm still in baby step mode but feel as though progress has increased exponentially. Sorry about the long-winded comment but I'm trying to express how much these things mean when pushing for better things. Project template/organisation - extreme time saver. Vision - having a focus of where the piece is going and working towards that. Plugins - it's easy to download all the free ones but I'd suggest only getting the ones you NEED as you work through. I think logic is pretty comprehensive (from what I've heard) so you're probably good there. Keyboard shortcuts - Again, time saving. There are more but I'll end up writing a book. You'll know that it's all about creating music and the idea is for the daw part to be almost non existent, allowing for the creative part to flow as freely as possible. Anyway, again, good luck with everything and thanks for your words. Enjoy what you do. You seem to be ahead of the game with your foundational work, which will pay back as much as you put into it. Take care!
I would like to see a comprehensive video about instruments in the orchestra and what they can or cannot play, to make the music sound more real. Especially timpani. Most people don't understand that the timpani often cannot play all notes within its range at once.
Good point. I'm no expert and am trying to put time into learning my daw but classical writing is alien to me, even though I like to use classical instruments when creating. I soon realised, when attempting to create for an orchestra, that hitting notes on my midi keyboard wasn't going to work, because I now had to imagine someone physically being able to play the notes on an instrument. For example, I can hold multiple notes down using the keyboard but it would be impossible for, say, a violin to play those notes all at once. The timpani and percussion I realised was the same issue. Using one percussionist meant imagining what they are able to play and whether there could be room for a few instances of multiple percussion instruments, if made simple enough. As said, I'm a beginner with the technical aspects but find it interesting because of the different approaches to creating, which I never would've thought about before. So, yes, I'd be all for some basics on orchestral writing, especially regarding limits to think about when creating for instruments that cannot physically play everything you commit to the page.
That's interesting. Thanks for the feedback. I thought slow opening and moody atmospheric music was expected because of the photo. I'm just hobbyist though and have little experience. Didn't expect there will be 800+ tracks. Maybe Ryan could simply tell what kind of music he expects in the next one, just to make his life easier.
I didn't express myself very well on that point, I did choose a few of the slower moody pieces but what I meant was that I noticed none of those performed as well with the judges
Thanks for these tips. Please do more on sample libraries. I have no idea where to start with these and was guilty of using default musescore soundbank.
Thanks again for hosting the competition: I had a wonderful time entering, and to be clear, I was never going to win anyway. But may I push back slightly on your comment here about production values? What I love about your channel is its focus on composition and orchestration. My interest (right now, at least) is not on the production side, and it doesn't seem to be much of a feature of your videos, either. So maybe the competition could include a category for composition only, independent of questions of production quality?
Wonderful breakdown! Especially interested in your point about looping chord progressions vs. the more appropriate orchestral styles. Do you have any resources you'd recommend that help break down the different approaches? This is something that's been really hard for me to wrap my head around.
Thank you for this. I know it must be hard because you have so many work to listen to, but it doesn't mean that people submitting music later on are working on the competition longer. It can also be because some of us have work commitment until later on before the deadline. In my case for exemple, I have deadlines with music jobs and I will have only a few days before the deadline of the competition to submit my work for the competition. Maybe put a shorter deadline?
So basically if we ignore the chance on whether or not to enter a competition, but treat this advice in what or how a real world listener might assess anything put before them . . .
4:00 I disagree with you and do indeed feel that buying a better sample-library than your rivals is buying an advantage. Yes, free sample-libraries exist but they are not very good. Just what is it that is worth holding a competition for? How good a sample-library you can buy? Or how well you can compose music which will be performed by a symphony orchestra?
This time around we had plenty of live musicians as well, including some small groups (eg flute and piano) with no sample libraries involved at all. Sure having the finest ingredients will help your chances in a cooking competition, but send me into a kitchen with the best ingredients in the world and Gordon Ramsey in with leftovers from a summer cookout and I feel fairly confident that he's still going to win!
Super informative! Thank you for making this video. It was fun to participate and learn from everyone else. Is it safe to say that the honorable mentions for the contest were tracks originally in your "Keep" folder, but were bumped out as more submissions came in?
This was dope! For those of us who volunteered our tracks as tribute, were they removed from the running even if it wasn't selected as the tribute track?
Appreciate the honesty and transparency, but there are important details you didn't really touch on in this video and this kind of thing is why I don't typically bother with competitions and I personally don't think people should take them seriously. Firstly, I think you should've mentioned that you did the thing with using a volunteer track as a "baseline", which IMO is very bizarre. So it's a competition to score a photo...but actually, you're being judged on the relevance to an ostensibly arbitrarily-selected track you're unaware of. Not exactly fair to say the least and essentially changes a core criteria of the competition... But then, you say that you're biased to orchestral tracks and are judging on production value as well. Well, to create a serious orchestral piece (not Zimmer bwwaams) in the kind of style that you like (Powell, Williams, Kondo etc.) with samples of even thousands of dollars (never mind free ones that are out there and almost-universally suck at real orchestral music) is no small feat. That's going to eliminate a massive chunk of your own base, who are mostly amateurs on your page to learn. You also said you accepted "any" style of music, but then basically admit here that if it wasn't more like Golden Age Romantic scores, which also had relevance to some "baseline" track that they are unaware of, they were basically dead in the water. Doesn't really bother me, because like I said - I don't take these competitions seriously and all it did for me was inspire me to start a new track I was going to finish anyway, but for everyone's sake: I think you should make it a lot more clear on your next one as to exactly what you're looking for right out of the gate. No mystery baseline tracks, limit the genre from the get-go, etc.
Unfortunately I think you misunderstood me on a few points, which means I didn't explain myself well. The volunteer tribute track was so the judges could set an expectation of the level of quality to expect. Not that that's what the other tracks needed to sound like. It was simply a way to prevent anyone from having to go in the unfair position of first. The baseline had absolutely nothing to do with which tracks I chose as finalists. There is a misunderstanding that there was a hidden "bias" that I was keeping from people, all I'm saying is that tracks that were in a style I liked were just naturally going to pique my interest and stand out. Note the title of the video: "What I learned". Not "What I was secretly expecting but didn't tell you".
Good advices, unfortunately i missed the competition. Now being nitpicky about the "if it sounds bad don't use it", what does it mean sounding bad? Isn't music all subjective? There's no such thing as a bad instrument, but composers who don't know how to use it.
Of course "bad" is a loaded term, but I think often people know the sample/sound isn't convincing but ignore it because they imagine it the way it's intended
@@RyanLeach Could you maybe make a video about libraries that meet your expectations as a pro? (and maybe which don't or which ones you find hidden gems)
Is composing solely for piano a problem? I happened to notice none of the finalists were purely solo instrumental, so i just want to know whether i should focus more on transcribing And making arrangements for the next one. Thanks a Lot! Really appreciate the work you do.
That’s a both good and tough question. It might be the context of this photo which to me had a certain cinematic quality to it and so a solo piano piece would have to work extra hard to get there
If you guys are going to "judge the book by its cover" by choosing which sounds fit better, then separate people who are just using free stuff, we're just starting in the business and don't have money to spend on big libraries...
A good idea but very hard to validate. And of course the quality of the library only gets you so far, I don't think people should worry about being out-purchased because you can still take an expensive library and not do much with it
@@GoOKuSj33 I understand what you mean and can empathise but the way I look at it, is that it's an opportunity to create, using a deadline as a cutoff point, meaning discipline in the art. I don't think of it as competition, partly because it's a matter of taste, ultimately, and also because I'm nowhere near proficient, technically. I suppose my aim is to keep creating and improving to the point where I have faith in whatever I'm doing. Creation doesn't recognise competition and so my approach (now) is to do SOMETHING and try to 'finish' it by the deadline. Once you remove the competitive part, it's easier to relax into, meaning you only think about your own journey, which is lifelong. Winning doesn't guarantee anything but experience is something you gain through whatever you do. I've noticed definite improvements in my approach and, once I decided that whatever I produce isn't sacred, it made the process easier. So, for me, competition is a good thing. It gives me a deadline and a focus and means I learn much more quickly along the way.
I'm happy with Logic, been using it for 15+ years though. If I was starting from nothing I might go with Cubase just because I like Dorico and they come from the same parent company
@@RyanLeach I seriously looked at Cubase but as a hobbyist the price is quite excessive. I ended up with an old mac and Logic Pro, as I find it easiest to use.
@@RyanLeach Maybe I made a mistake when posting. I am in mourning right now because I found out that Vangelis died. He was one of my biggest inspirations in my whole life. I wrote that it is nonsense that someone who has the best library also wins. A really good musician makes good music even from the cheapest libraries. Because of the contest I would have liked a little opinion of my music from you. But with so many entries, that would have been too much stress. I didn't win, of course, but I'll be back next time. Maybe a 2 minute track this time?
You say you prefer orchestral music, but then you recommend people without expensive libraries to not write orchestral music. I didn't enter this contest, and I normally really love your channel, but I wonder of this contest really should have said who its demographic was.
A decent library used well does not have to be the same as an expensive library. I also said I like pop and alternative, and that cinematic orchestral was just "a head start". I'm guessing you didn't listen to the finalists because we had quite a few tracks that were in different genres. But yea it didn't have to be orchestral, if you only had a solo piano something like this would've been a pretty good fit for the dramatic look of the photo ua-cam.com/video/SlcQWUn5DeI/v-deo.html
Also I want to clarify, because what I really don't want is for people to be upset over a misunderstanding, is that there was no "hidden agenda" or "secret genre you should've know". It was just that I'm one guy listening to these and so of course I'm going to favor things that suit my tastes
@@RyanLeach I'll go listen to the finalists! I really shouldn't have posted this comment. I just got a bit upset because of my own financial situation, but I hope to invest in good sample libraries someday. :) For now I care more about composition, so I am just using Dorico's default. You are really cool and I'm sorry I let my insecurities write my comment above. :D
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #1 НАЧАЛО ПУТЕШЕСТВИЯ [Новый сезон] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/380Q7gLWGvk/mqdefault.jpg)
🥳 Competition T-shirts are now available!! tinyurl.com/2022comptshirts
🎹 Don't COMPOSE A MOTIVE Without This ua-cam.com/video/Ou0ydcar74o/v-deo.html
Really pleased to hear you say "when we do the next one" - unfortunately, I only came across your channel last month (I blame the algorithm) so missed the boat this time around but would love to participate if you do it again. I know you let yourself in for a world of grief when you start judging competitions (I remember the furore when Spitfire did the Westworld one) but please ignore it as it's so valuable for beginners and hobbyists to have a project to work towards, other entrants with the same brief to compare our scores to, and of course some feedback from judges. I know there are lots of us who really appreciate the effort (and it must have been substantial!) that you've put in here. Oh, and the channel is fantastic, by the way - it's quickly become one of my favourites, so thanks for that too!
I do wish these sorts of competitions were broken out by skill level. I hazard the problem is that to make such a thing work, there would have to be a pre-screening process and a lack of announcement that it would be skill-tiered first, to prevent sandbaggers from rigging their scores. :|
A great idea but sounds really hard to pull off well!
@@RyanLeach agreed. Listening to the entries, I am way too far out of my league XD
@@FormulaXFD yeah that’s what I felt also. It was super humbling to hear all that great music.
Art should not be judged on ‘skill’.
That is what sport is for.
@@FormulaXFDdon’t keep yourself from doing a submission just because you don’t think you’ll be a finalist. It’s about growing in your craft and challenging yourself. I just found out about this challenge, and I’ll be doing this first one in 2024 even though I just recently got into making music, and I’m still using all free software. Even if my track isn’t that good, I’ll still learn and get better 😃
Everything you said had reasonable justification. Naysay to the haters. Great video.
Wonderful insight!
I went in to the competition confident, but during the live stream was IMMEDIATELY humbled by the skill of the finalists.
Definitely a valuable lesson and I was urgently taking notes the entire time.
I’m definitely going to enter again after lots and lots of practice.
Thanks for the follow up!
This is very insightful, I appreciate your comments. Thank you for being so gracious with your time and sharing the process.
I really like the feedback given by you , helpful for both current and aspiring composers....
Thank you.
You're still giving value to this competition.
Really great job.
Thank you 👍
People don’t like the synth-based videos??? I was super into those, along with most of the orchestral content. Lots of smart and easily digestible perspectives on how to write and use different tools in the toolkit. Besides, knowledge is power.
Oh yea any tech related videos get way fewer views, but that's fine there are plenty of good tech channels out there
Thanks Ryan. That's useful. I had no particular expectations myself, but thought it would be fun to join in and share the experience and then see how what I did compared to what the finalists did for future reference. This sums that up very nicely.
Huh... as a listener it seemed the tracks were universally trying to do too much. To score one picture with no action at all on screen, some of them were incredibly busy, flurries of movement, and I thought the one thing I'd learned is that while there's a staggering amount of skill, craft, tech out there universally we try too hard thinking every piece has to be *the* piece, put everything and the kitchen sink in, etc... Hearing you were actually looking for this, did get a lot of the kind of moody atmosphere tracks most people would think the picture called for and threw them out was a surprise.
Don’t worry I wasn’t “looking for this”, i just noticed that those were the ones that judges favored
@@RyanLeach Thank you for the response.
Oh wow, I would've loved to participate! Too bad I didn't discover your channel until just last month! So relieved to hear you're going to host another one soon! I'd love to write and submit something, especially since film scoring and video game soundtracks is what I aspire to do professionally with my music! I will be keeping a close eye out for the next competition! Just out of curiosity, what were the prizes?
It was a great success Ryan. Looking forward to the next one .
Uh .... you made a rational and clear explanation of why I started to make a modular generative piece for your contest but ended up with no submission and 2 weird pieces one on PI and the other on whales 🥳 Let's see the next contest. Keep going with your great videos on composition!
Thanks for this experience, this all makes sense and I feel like I got a new perspective on writing. Cheers
Perhaps put a cap on the number of submissions that you accept for next time. That's a lot of listening and extremely difficult to compare that many tracks. Well done. A photographer on UA-cam I follow runs a photo contest that charges an entry fee. All the money raised goes to charity....
Yea good ideas and things to consider. Entry fee, even a small amount for charity, would probably drop the number of entries to 1/4 the amount. A cap like "only the first 500 entries get in" feels like it might cause people to rush to get in. And maybe the novelty has worn off and less people will participate next time. Who knows I guess.
@@RyanLeach Figured it out! When you sign up and pay, you don't have to submit the piece right away. That way no one is rushed....which I agree is a problem you don't want.
@@mgbchoralmusic6443 That's a nice solution for that problem
I actually stand to learn the most from you about the production, getting a desktop computer for it, and the right libraries and DAW and whatnot to produce a polished track. As musicians it is just a lot less exciting to most of us probably but it's just a necessary matter of work and craft
How are you doing with that? I'm no expert but there are definitely things I would do differently if starting over. No matter what, as long as you keep creating, the learning will be a natural by-product. Good luck with it!
@@johnnymorell4974 I am now studying essentially thoroughbass and improvisation with Nicola Canzano, a brilliant fugue improviser. I hope to build a rock solid foundation in my music fundamentals fluency, my ear, my counterpoint, etc that will serve to bolster my compositions.
@@lerippletoe6893 Sounds like you're in good company. You mentioned a computer and daw. I still find it quite amazing that we can create music anywhere, regardless of living quarters, etc and, relatively, inexpensively. As you said, the technical side (computer, daw, etc) may be a necessary evil and can be a distraction but, obviously, it's one of the prices to pay for the ability to produce oneself.
My own notes to a freshly starting out self would be to keep it simple. At the beginning, you fumble around, searching for the best advice from whoever you can find but at some point, you have to take the plunge. I use Reaper, which has a solid community and is well worth the price. It has a notation editor but I can't say how well it works because I can't notate and have no point of reference. I would also tell myself to stick with the vanilla version and learn using the stock plugins before anything else. The amount of options when it comes to sound design can be quite crippling, creatively but the other part of me is glad of the options, especially now I'm starting to focus on each project with a tighter vision of what I'm looking for.
Thanks for the response.
I hope your experiences take you far away, into the realm of imagination and expression and that you gain a sense of fulfillment throughout your journey.
Take care.
@@johnnymorell4974 I have a macbook pro so I have logic pro x with it already. I should start adding in chunks to what I'm doing, it's just hard to do the organizational tasks of getting started in different things without diverting all your momentum. Considering I work, try to exercise enough for health, trying to practice a few hours every day, listen to music sometimes few hours, and then writing and revising music.
I think transitioning back to more polished and modern works would make sense after getting this thoroughbass foundation solid now that I have a great teacher. My money goes further the nore work I put into what he guides me to and corrects. I should make room for free creative time for sure though, to get a bank of more orchestration based ideas. Thanks for the feedback, I hope things are going well for you too!
@@lerippletoe6893 Ah, I see. Logic is meant to be solid. It's about using what you have and really getting to know how it works. To be honest, I'm not an orchestral creator, though I do use classical instruments in projects. I don't have a particular style or genre and like to experiment.
It changed for me when I entered a competition. It meant a deadline and also allowed me to hear what others were doing. I tried not to listen to too many others' work and a few times along the way decided I probably wasn't good enough, technically, to enter and left it alone for a while. In the end I realised I would always think this way and never push forward, so relaxed and took the competition aspect as a challenge to myself and a simple deadline. The deadline is the most important thing to have in focus.
I've never had an issue with creativity but it meant having a building pile is unfinished ideas, which I'd probably never go back to. Again, it hit me that discipline was where I needed to concentrate.
I learned so much just by having that deadline. The piece contained a classical build and I discovered I could articulate and manipulate sounds more than I thought was possible. Greater than that though, was the idea of workflow. It's funny but, at the very beginning of my daw journey, there were tips regarding these basics but you tend to overlook those things and start to dive in.. only looking up methods as you go. Then you come full circle and realise it was the truth. I think you have to go through that process to fully comprehend it.
I read comments from those who say they're not good enough and I understand where they're coming from but I would say just go for it. There's nothing to lose and everything to gain. It's not about winning a competition but how much you learn from the discipline. It's extremely rewarding and I'm still in baby step mode but feel as though progress has increased exponentially.
Sorry about the long-winded comment but I'm trying to express how much these things mean when pushing for better things.
Project template/organisation - extreme time saver.
Vision - having a focus of where the piece is going and working towards that.
Plugins - it's easy to download all the free ones but I'd suggest only getting the ones you NEED as you work through. I think logic is pretty comprehensive (from what I've heard) so you're probably good there.
Keyboard shortcuts - Again, time saving.
There are more but I'll end up writing a book. You'll know that it's all about creating music and the idea is for the daw part to be almost non existent, allowing for the creative part to flow as freely as possible.
Anyway, again, good luck with everything and thanks for your words. Enjoy what you do. You seem to be ahead of the game with your foundational work, which will pay back as much as you put into it.
Take care!
This is valuable information, thank you!
I would like to see a comprehensive video about instruments in the orchestra and what they can or cannot play, to make the music sound more real. Especially timpani. Most people don't understand that the timpani often cannot play all notes within its range at once.
Good point. I'm no expert and am trying to put time into learning my daw but classical writing is alien to me, even though I like to use classical instruments when creating.
I soon realised, when attempting to create for an orchestra, that hitting notes on my midi keyboard wasn't going to work, because I now had to imagine someone physically being able to play the notes on an instrument. For example, I can hold multiple notes down using the keyboard but it would be impossible for, say, a violin to play those notes all at once. The timpani and percussion I realised was the same issue. Using one percussionist meant imagining what they are able to play and whether there could be room for a few instances of multiple percussion instruments, if made simple enough. As said, I'm a beginner with the technical aspects but find it interesting because of the different approaches to creating, which I never would've thought about before.
So, yes, I'd be all for some basics on orchestral writing, especially regarding limits to think about when creating for instruments that cannot physically play everything you commit to the page.
Great Feedback! Thanks Ryan
I didn’t participate but it sounds like there were a lot of salty composers that did. Ryan is right about all of these things
That's interesting. Thanks for the feedback. I thought slow opening and moody atmospheric music was expected because of the photo. I'm just hobbyist though and have little experience. Didn't expect there will be 800+ tracks.
Maybe Ryan could simply tell what kind of music he expects in the next one, just to make his life easier.
I didn't express myself very well on that point, I did choose a few of the slower moody pieces but what I meant was that I noticed none of those performed as well with the judges
Thanks for these tips. Please do more on sample libraries. I have no idea where to start with these and was guilty of using default musescore soundbank.
Great feedback , thanks
Shame I miss it 😕 been working a lot lately and barely have time to breath, I miss composing music a lot 😥 need to find more time to practice again.
I wanted to participate sooo bad, sadly this month i had a lot of work, hope to enter the next one
This was helpful for me. Thanks Ryan.
Looking forward to a next one, will be a good challenge.
Thanks again for hosting the competition: I had a wonderful time entering, and to be clear, I was never going to win anyway. But may I push back slightly on your comment here about production values? What I love about your channel is its focus on composition and orchestration. My interest (right now, at least) is not on the production side, and it doesn't seem to be much of a feature of your videos, either. So maybe the competition could include a category for composition only, independent of questions of production quality?
Wonderful breakdown! Especially interested in your point about looping chord progressions vs. the more appropriate orchestral styles. Do you have any resources you'd recommend that help break down the different approaches? This is something that's been really hard for me to wrap my head around.
Didn’t find the time to participate in this one but super interesting and great feedback
Thank you for this. I know it must be hard because you have so many work to listen to, but it doesn't mean that people submitting music later on are working on the competition longer. It can also be because some of us have work commitment until later on before the deadline.
In my case for exemple, I have deadlines with music jobs and I will have only a few days before the deadline of the competition to submit my work for the competition.
Maybe put a shorter deadline?
Where can I listen to the winners of past contests?
So basically if we ignore the chance on whether or not to enter a competition, but treat this advice in what or how a real world listener might assess anything put before them . . .
4:00 I disagree with you and do indeed feel that buying a better sample-library than your rivals is buying an advantage. Yes, free sample-libraries exist but they are not very good. Just what is it that is worth holding a competition for? How good a sample-library you can buy? Or how well you can compose music which will be performed by a symphony orchestra?
This time around we had plenty of live musicians as well, including some small groups (eg flute and piano) with no sample libraries involved at all.
Sure having the finest ingredients will help your chances in a cooking competition, but send me into a kitchen with the best ingredients in the world and Gordon Ramsey in with leftovers from a summer cookout and I feel fairly confident that he's still going to win!
Super informative! Thank you for making this video. It was fun to participate and learn from everyone else. Is it safe to say that the honorable mentions for the contest were tracks originally in your "Keep" folder, but were bumped out as more submissions came in?
If your name starts with an ‘J’, you’ve probably had a head start.
I considered that joke. Actually both guys in They Might Be Giants are John so 5 of the 7 I mentioned
good feedback 👍
Thanks , but I would not submit another track
I completely missed the competition. Where can I follow you to make sure I don't for future comps? I would love to submit something next time.
Ryan has a discord server which has all the details for everything.
I believe it’s in the video description
Yea Discord is good (see description of any video), I also will make an announcement video for the next one (look for it late June)
This was dope! For those of us who volunteered our tracks as tribute, were they removed from the running even if it wasn't selected as the tribute track?
No they weren’t removed, sorry if people were worried they made a mistake checking that box!
@@RyanLeach Cool. Thanks!
Appreciate the honesty and transparency, but there are important details you didn't really touch on in this video and this kind of thing is why I don't typically bother with competitions and I personally don't think people should take them seriously. Firstly, I think you should've mentioned that you did the thing with using a volunteer track as a "baseline", which IMO is very bizarre. So it's a competition to score a photo...but actually, you're being judged on the relevance to an ostensibly arbitrarily-selected track you're unaware of. Not exactly fair to say the least and essentially changes a core criteria of the competition...
But then, you say that you're biased to orchestral tracks and are judging on production value as well. Well, to create a serious orchestral piece (not Zimmer bwwaams) in the kind of style that you like (Powell, Williams, Kondo etc.) with samples of even thousands of dollars (never mind free ones that are out there and almost-universally suck at real orchestral music) is no small feat. That's going to eliminate a massive chunk of your own base, who are mostly amateurs on your page to learn. You also said you accepted "any" style of music, but then basically admit here that if it wasn't more like Golden Age Romantic scores, which also had relevance to some "baseline" track that they are unaware of, they were basically dead in the water.
Doesn't really bother me, because like I said - I don't take these competitions seriously and all it did for me was inspire me to start a new track I was going to finish anyway, but for everyone's sake: I think you should make it a lot more clear on your next one as to exactly what you're looking for right out of the gate. No mystery baseline tracks, limit the genre from the get-go, etc.
Unfortunately I think you misunderstood me on a few points, which means I didn't explain myself well.
The volunteer tribute track was so the judges could set an expectation of the level of quality to expect. Not that that's what the other tracks needed to sound like. It was simply a way to prevent anyone from having to go in the unfair position of first.
The baseline had absolutely nothing to do with which tracks I chose as finalists. There is a misunderstanding that there was a hidden "bias" that I was keeping from people, all I'm saying is that tracks that were in a style I liked were just naturally going to pique my interest and stand out.
Note the title of the video: "What I learned". Not "What I was secretly expecting but didn't tell you".
Good advices, unfortunately i missed the competition. Now being nitpicky about the "if it sounds bad don't use it", what does it mean sounding bad? Isn't music all subjective? There's no such thing as a bad instrument, but composers who don't know how to use it.
Of course "bad" is a loaded term, but I think often people know the sample/sound isn't convincing but ignore it because they imagine it the way it's intended
@@RyanLeach Also true, there's much more to midi than just choosing the right patch.
@@RyanLeach Could you maybe make a video about libraries that meet your expectations as a pro? (and maybe which don't or which ones you find hidden gems)
Good video
I use noteperformer so I haven’t really worried about mixing lol just let it tho it’s thing
Is composing solely for piano a problem? I happened to notice none of the finalists were purely solo instrumental, so i just want to know whether i should focus more on transcribing And making arrangements for the next one. Thanks a Lot! Really appreciate the work you do.
That’s a both good and tough question. It might be the context of this photo which to me had a certain cinematic quality to it and so a solo piano piece would have to work extra hard to get there
Well, despite all the considerations and sort of tips I feel discouraged to participate on the next one. Thank you anyway.
I recognize it would take a while, but if you could still give feedback for each of the pieces even if they don't make it, thatd be really nice
Just listening to each track without pausing to say a word about them is over 20 hours
@@RyanLeach yeah I figured it would take too long. I was stunned when I heard there were 800+ entries. Oh well
Or, limit the tracks to 100 or 200 entries
I made a song for this but forgot to submit it. It was a good song lol.
The one that got away
Have you improved the form, yet?
Do you mean the submission form? Open to suggestions
Oh nice, thank you Discord bot for a notification
Always good to know things are working as intended!
If you guys are going to "judge the book by its cover" by choosing which sounds fit better, then separate people who are just using free stuff, we're just starting in the business and don't have money to spend on big libraries...
A good idea but very hard to validate. And of course the quality of the library only gets you so far, I don't think people should worry about being out-purchased because you can still take an expensive library and not do much with it
@@RyanLeach True. There's something aesthetic I don't like about this, but i can understand why it was judged this way.
@@GoOKuSj33 I understand what you mean and can empathise but the way I look at it, is that it's an opportunity to create, using a deadline as a cutoff point, meaning discipline in the art. I don't think of it as competition, partly because it's a matter of taste, ultimately, and also because I'm nowhere near proficient, technically. I suppose my aim is to keep creating and improving to the point where I have faith in whatever I'm doing. Creation doesn't recognise competition and so my approach (now) is to do SOMETHING and try to 'finish' it by the deadline. Once you remove the competitive part, it's easier to relax into, meaning you only think about your own journey, which is lifelong. Winning doesn't guarantee anything but experience is something you gain through whatever you do. I've noticed definite improvements in my approach and, once I decided that whatever I produce isn't sacred, it made the process easier.
So, for me, competition is a good thing. It gives me a deadline and a focus and means I learn much more quickly along the way.
PLEASE tell me which free DAW you think is actually good... my experience with them has been awful across the board
I'm happy with Logic, been using it for 15+ years though. If I was starting from nothing I might go with Cubase just because I like Dorico and they come from the same parent company
If you have a Mac I also recommend Logic Pro X. If you don't want to spend 299€ for it. You can also find unlimited testing versions on the internet
Sorry I missed when you said “free”. Reaper is a popular choice
@@RyanLeach I seriously looked at Cubase but as a hobbyist the price is quite excessive. I ended up with an old mac and Logic Pro, as I find it easiest to use.
Why was my comment deleted?
I don’t know, what was the comment?
@@RyanLeach Maybe I made a mistake when posting. I am in mourning right now because I found out that Vangelis died. He was one of my biggest inspirations in my whole life. I wrote that it is nonsense that someone who has the best library also wins. A really good musician makes good music even from the cheapest libraries. Because of the contest I would have liked a little opinion of my music from you. But with so many entries, that would have been too much stress. I didn't win, of course, but I'll be back next time. Maybe a 2 minute track this time?
You say you prefer orchestral music, but then you recommend people without expensive libraries to not write orchestral music. I didn't enter this contest, and I normally really love your channel, but I wonder of this contest really should have said who its demographic was.
A decent library used well does not have to be the same as an expensive library. I also said I like pop and alternative, and that cinematic orchestral was just "a head start". I'm guessing you didn't listen to the finalists because we had quite a few tracks that were in different genres. But yea it didn't have to be orchestral, if you only had a solo piano something like this would've been a pretty good fit for the dramatic look of the photo ua-cam.com/video/SlcQWUn5DeI/v-deo.html
Also I want to clarify, because what I really don't want is for people to be upset over a misunderstanding, is that there was no "hidden agenda" or "secret genre you should've know". It was just that I'm one guy listening to these and so of course I'm going to favor things that suit my tastes
@@RyanLeach I'll go listen to the finalists! I really shouldn't have posted this comment. I just got a bit upset because of my own financial situation, but I hope to invest in good sample libraries someday. :) For now I care more about composition, so I am just using Dorico's default. You are really cool and I'm sorry I let my insecurities write my comment above. :D
The Weird Al shout out hell yeah dude
ea
Well, that was a tad underwhelming. I expected examples shown using the competing music.
Dude very cool and transparent video, but I'm getting concerned uif you're getting enough sleep