Originally Posted by: William

The fact almost nobody here cares about this post is really disturbing.  Here is a great composer and artist talking about how he survived nearly dying, and doing the most fabulous music as a result ---  and nobody here except me and Macker gives a damn. 

Guy -  I love your music, and you are a fabulous artist.  You have really original ideas and tremendous mastery of technique. You can do anything  in music.  My best wishes to you and all of your work.          

Thank you very much, William. I appreciate your thoughtful message and compliments. MMKA did send me a compassionate message via PM.

I was pleased to find that my cardiac surgeon loved the work and shared it with all of her medical colleagues, who all regarded it as a great honor.

I wouldn't say that people are uninterested in this post; but, the fact that it is a 12-minute piece requires some patience to sit through, which is understandable.

I'm pleased to share this piece I wrote following my open-heart surgery for a valve replacement on May 28, 2021. I was inspired to write a piece about my experience, but I also wanted it to be an homage to science's miracles and a way to thank everyone at the CHUM, especially my cardiac surgeon, Dr. Jessica Forcillo, to whom this work is dedicated.

"Pulse" (Symphonic Suite)

Maybe a suggestion could be to have a 2nd demo section which would be categorized in chronological order, or at least by years. 

Originally Posted by: William

Another excellent piece by Guy Bacos who seems to be able to write music about anything. Paolo I like that list of sports in music!

Thanks so much William! Starting to write the score, wish me luck! 

Yes, but film music will always follow the trend its time, so you can't be too critical on that. I'm sure Stravinsky or Rachmaninov didn't have much esteem  for the film composers during their lifetime. It's a completely different art form and Hans Zimmer is just following the trend of his time and I honestly don't think he has any pretense about it, and it doesn't take anything away from Jerry Goldsmith or Bernard Herrmann which I admire as much as anybody else, but even if they were alive today, they surely would of had to adapt their styles to the current trend.

Anyway William, keep doing what you're doing,  you do it very well, it's great music, nothing to envy.

Originally Posted by: agitato

 

Also this left me wishing that Hollywood films employed composers like you and Guy Bacos rather than the repetitive crap thats out there. 

Anand

Hi Anand,

The comment is well appreciated (not just for me) and this is brought up now and then. Why not talk about it now? My apology William for hi-jacking this thread temporarily. Scoring for films is a different type of art and dedication. One could be an excellent composer and not do well scoring films, and one could be an excellent film composer but not able to write a stand alone concert piece. Very rare are film composers who could do both well. Danny Elfman recently wrote a violin concerto, I haven't heard it yet and can't say anything about it. There is also the collaboration aspect, you are the servant of the director in a manner of speaking. Are you comfortable with that? If he gives you 5 min to redo a scene, will you be to handle that? If he wants a style of music for a scene you find denigrating, can you work with that? I personally happen to prefer stand alone concert music, and like to have full control of what I want. I wouldn't want to spend my life writing film music, despite the glamor side sometimes associated with it, and nothing wrong with that or any other aspects of the craft. On the other hand, there is a prestige associated with concert music along with the long tradition of concert music. Many of the great 20th century composers would refuse to write film music even when offered. Possibly they might of been bad at it too. Anyway, this could be a discussion that could go on and on, but just thought I'd put in my 2 cents. 

Here is the Screencast

Thank you for the great feedback! 

Interesting feedback, perhaps I'm more open to a style like this, however it would be described. Certainly influence from composers such as Stravinsky as well as many others and jazz harmony influence. Someone on another forum described the piece as a ballet, I thought that was flattering, it was kind of that idea I had although the term ballet never entered my mind. It's true the idea of making a kind of symphonic poem around a tennis match may sound strange, but that was the challenge, and I must admit if I didn't play the sport, it wouldn't be the same, the passion I have for the sport was the main driving force in the creation process. I'm only a club player though and my backhand is not as impressive as what we hear in the piece. :) I think it might be a fun piece for orchestra to perform, despite the massive percussion section. 

ps I will also be doing a screencast.

Over 5 years ago I had written a piece describing a tennis match, however was never really happy with it.

This piece is completely new: A symphonic impression of a tennis match. Hope you enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3F3jIaHqusY&feature=emb_logo

All done with VSL

Welcome, glad that solved it. So many possibilities just by tweaking the mixer faders, worth playing around with them.

I may see what's going on. What I'm hearing is the Concert-Room-Mix preset, however, in my version, the sound is drier and cleaner, which is what you like. I have a feeling that something in the midi file transfer didn't transfer correctly. Click on Concert-Room-Mix preset and manually lower the Room-Mix fader to -7.2. 

I just saw the video you sent,  that is stange, let me see what could be the issue.

Hi Carlspost,

I opened the Chopin op 10 no 4 Étude file, I'm affraid I don't understand, I played it from my sequencer and it's the same as the mp3 on the website. Am I missing something? The only thing I did was increased the volume. 

Guy

Cool, I like it!

A dear friend and contributor of this forum has passed away.

His wife left this message on her FB wall:

I have sad news about my husband Paul McGraw. Paul passed away at home on Saturday night. As you may know, he has been very ill for the past year, especially since October, due to congestive heart failure, multiple myeloma, COPD, diabetes, and degenerative spine and discs conditions. The last few months of his life he was in ever-increasing pain.
He was ready to go home to Heaven, so we family members who survive here on Earth must remember that he is there in peace with no pain and no failing body.
Paul had many talents. He especially enjoyed composing orchestral music via computer programs. It would be a wonderful tribute to his memory if you would listen to some of his compositions on his YouTube channel. (Just search for Paul McGraw.)
I've added a few pictures from happier times. ❤️

Excellent!

I never tried the time stretch for this, interesting. Another option, and the most common I use in these cases, is simply to to play a gliss on your keyboard from the starting to end note, practice a few times timing it, and then add the appropriate accidentals in the piano roll. I also repeat some notes to make it more realistic.

I wrote this piece yesteday, see if you could guess what are the instruments. No prize. :) 

The Quandary

Sounds really good.

Paul did you work on the mix since the 1st time it was posted? 

Very nice MMKA! I really enjoyed listening to this, nice musicality and I appreciate the simplicity, I mean this in a positive way of course. Also excellent programming on the violin.

Cheers Paul, and best wishes for the holidays and the coming year to all!   

Guy

I just have to say, I really enjoy playing on this Steinway, the crisp attacks, roundness of the sound, clarity and balance is stunning.

How to quickly sketch an orchestral arrangement with the Vienna Smart Orchestra. 

Chapter 4 added.

Thanks Paul! :) 

Originally Posted by: mobileavatar

Originally Posted by: Guy Bacos

 

The Synchron Player, and especially the latest version, is very cool, I was able to do this Synchron Percussion demo in just a few hours last night, really make things simpler. 

The Eye of the Storm

Hi Guy,

Excellent demos! I noticed you had used "surround-to-stereo downmix" for "Eye of the Storm", did you use the full library for "The Big Bang" as well?

Regards,

mobileavatar

Hi mobileavatar,

I believe so.