Help us "Crowd Create" the Theme from HALO - and Break a Guinness Record.

Attention All Musicians and Game Music Fans!

Help Eimear Noone, The Dublin International 
Video Game Music Festival and Video Games Live

Break a Guinness World Record.

As many of you know, on April 4th, 2015, at the 1st Dublin International Game Music Festival, Eimear Noone combined 134 musicians and singers on stage at the Convention Center Dublin, with 128 videos submitted from musicians around the world - all coming together to "Crowd Create" Eimear's"Malach," theme from the original score to "World of Warcraft; Warlords of Draenor."  It was one of the great highlights to the festival and the headlining Video Games Live Show.  You can see the result below.

A big thanks to Malukah for her absolutely brilliant performance as the "high priestess" of the piece.

Eimear Noone's "Malach," Crowd Created Version.

As we plan for year 2 of The Dublin International Game Music Festival, (April 29-30 at the RDS, and May 1st at the Convention Center Dublin), everyone is asking us the question, "What epic event will the iDIG Music Fest team pull off this year.

After much consideration, we've decided it wouldn't be enough to just create another crowd created video, but this time, we need to set a Guinness World Record for the most videos of individual players combined to recreate a single piece of music.  

With this goal in mind, we decided that the "Video Games Live" version of the original theme from "HALO," (by Marty O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori, orchestrated by Emmanuel Fratianni, Laurie Robinson, & Benoît Grey) would be the perfect piece to accomplish this task.  

So we reached out to both our friend Tommy Tallarico (of Video Games Live) and our friends at Microsoft to see if they would be on board.  They instantly agreed to the idea - but it's taken a bit to work through the details.  We've been waiting for the approvals...

Which just came through -  so we are off and running.  We are thrilled!

Sign Up Now

Our auto-responder takes up to a day... 

The Process:

Step 1:  

Click on this link.   The link will take you to a sign-up page where you will find the download link to all of the parts and the audio guide track for the "Halo Theme."  You must sign up to download the files.

Step 2:  

Download the parts as well as the audio guide track from the second link.  The guide track is a click track layered upon a mono mix of the arrangement we are recreating.  The zip has parts for the entire orchestra - find your part.

Step 3:  While listening to the guide track on an earbud or headphone, using a cell phone or video camera, video yourself playing your part/parts.  

If you have a way to record with a proper microphone and synchronize your audio to the video, then do so.  If you don't have that capability the audio recorded on the phone will work just fine.

Step 4:  

Make sure you identify the video file(s) with your name in the title so we know who to put in the credits!

Step 5:

Using "Wetransfer.com," send your video(s) to zeldaconductor@gmail.com.  Do not send the video as an attachment to an email as that will crash our email server.

Format:  

TUNING IS A440!

Ideally, your video file should be a 16 X 9, H.2.6.4 QuickTime file with stereo audio.  

Audio should be at 48K.

But if what you just read seems like gobbledygook to you, don't worry;  just send us the video.  We can import just about anything.

Synchronization:  

Below is a snapshot from the score.  You will notice the first bar is in 4/4 and the notation states "4 clicks to bar 1."

On the audio recording, in bar zero(the very top), you will hear a synth pad.  Then in bar 1 you will hear a gong and gran casa roll into bar 2, where the iconic theme is stated in male voices.  That's how you know where you are.

While listening to the click, if you could clap your hands exactly on the downbeat of bar one, that would be ideal.  This is the equivalent of the old "slate" you would see executed in a movie.  We use that clap to line-up your video with all the others.

If your part does not start until much later in the piece:

Clap your hands exactly on the downbeat 2 bars (or so) before you come in.  We'll know where you are and as long as you are accurate with your clap, we can line you up.

Try to do your part in one continuous performance.  This way, once we have the clap exactly lined up on the downbeat, as long as you play in sync with the click and guide track, your entire performance will be in sync when your part is lined up with our master session.

If one continuous take is not possible, that's OK too.  Likewise, if you don't include a clap.  These tools just make lining things up easier.

Click Instructions:

1.  The parts we are using come straight from the Video Games Live library and certain elements are originally designed to be specifically conducted and directed.  We've created a new click for this purpose.

Therefore at the top we have constructed a rubato click for the vocal part that follows the subtlety of the performance.  Likewise, for the tag in measure 139, the click goes momentarily into an 8th note click in order to be able to direct you through the ritard.  A listen or two to the click against the track and you will get it.

We've added these notations in your part (ignore the "Click Out" from the original part in measure 139).

2.  There are two guide tracks uploaded.  The first has the click hard right and the music hard left.  The second version is in mono with the click married to the guide track.

Depending on your method of recording, you might want one or there other, for example, if you record with just one headphone, use the mono version.

ATTIRE OR BACKGROUNDS IN THE VIDEO:

Please avoid clothes with logo's, game images, or anything that might cause us to infringe on a trademark.  Don't worry if you have already sent a video, we'll simply have to blur out logos.  

If you have an iDIG or VIDEO GAMES LIVE T-Shirt, those are OK!  Likewise, if you want to show off your band's T-shirt, that is OK too - as long as it's your brand.  

A million people may see this video - use it to show off your band.

Last Performance Notes:

As much as you might hate the sound of your voice or instrument without reverb, we ask that you send your tracks dry!  If your track is dry, then it's easier to make it blend with the rest of our tracks by giving all of them a matching reverb!  

Two examples follow, excerpts from Malach - just to give you an idea of what is expected of your video:

Mark Scholl, Percussion - we created the montage,

you send all the video individually.

Joe Pignato, Guitar

UPDATE

We just posted this montage from videos from Joe and Mark, created for this year!

It rocks!

Deadline:

THE DEADLINE HAS BEEN EXTENDED.  We would like to have all the videos by March 29, 2016 as we know it will take 6 weeks to compile, synchronize and mix everything.

If you can get your tracks in early, that's even better as every moment counts when undertaking such a complicated adventure.

The video will debut at the Video Games Live Show, May 1st at the Convention Center Dublin, Ireland, during the closing act of the Dublin International Game Music Festival.  We'd love to see you there is you can make it!

INCLUDE YOUR NAME IN THE TITLE OF YOUR VIDEO!

DON'T LET YOUR WORK GET LOST!

Sign Up Now

Our auto-responder takes up to a day...

Hear a live performance of the VGL HALO Theme

Get your tickets to the 2016 iDIG Music Festival.

An overview of The Dublin International Game Music Festival
April 29 - May 1st, 2016

The first video we received:  A truly special story.

Ever wonder what a music producer does? Watch in real time!

Ever wonder what a music producer does?

Last night I let the screen capture roll as I started building the mix for "Kaepora Gaebora" for our "Celtic Link" CD.

You can watch it all evolve in real time in this movie.

The performance features the magnificent violin of Odhrán O Casaide, and the stellar accompaniment on bodhran of Aimée Farrell Courtney.

It also features one of my favorite music production tools, the Vienna MIR Pro reverb.

Would you like to hear the finished mix?  Join out post-Kickstarter

Share with your fellow Zelda fans!

**UPDATE

Imagine you are the producer of a project.  What do you do when you can't decide what to do with a magnificent and perfect performance that doesn't fit into the overall construction of what you have planned for an album, but at the same time is so magnificent that it's not fair to keep the performance to yourself?

It's kind of like having a stolen Rembrandt.  You might enjoy it alone, but you can't show it to anyone nor share in the joy of the experience of viewing it.  That's how I feel about this track.

So here we are, sharing it with the world!  Enjoy!

The Celtic Link Team

Four must have books for the aspiring media composer!
   

Eimear Noone - "World of WarCraft," "Warlords of Draenor" Favorites

Eimear Noone, Conductor and Warlords of Draenor Composer.
Photo by Carlos Gauna

This is a delicate blog to write, fraught with danger at every turn of phrase.  

That's what it's like when you are married to a powerful musical sorceress.  I swear, when she is conducting an orchestra, while cueing the brass, I can see the fireballs as they explode from her fingers.

Yes, in addition to being her husband, I am also her biggest unabashed fan… if you did not notice already.  I am so thrilled to be posting this!

As those who follow either of our blogs will know, since January, both Eimear and I have been composing for Blizzard as they prepare "Warlords of Draenor," the next expansion of their mega-hit franchise, "Word of WarCraft."

We are beyond thrilled to be a part of a creative team that is so dedicated to great music, art and storytelling.

Many of you also know that Eimear has been conducting the orchestra in recording sessions for Blizzard for ages, but this is the first time "World of WarCraft" has included her own music.  It is simply stunning!

The game doesn't come out until November so we can't share the official versions of the music, but I just put together a YouTube playlist of Eimear's music based on fan postings.  Click on the link below to access the playlist of her favorites.

YouTube Playlist of our Warlords of Draenor Favorites

Like Eimear's Music?  Join our mailing list us through the box at the very top right, and we will send you a free MP3, a bonus track from her mini EP, Hibernian!

Photo by Carlos Gauna

"The Foundry" - From the Zone of Gorgrond, Warlords of Draenor Preview

It is such a pleasure to share the first of Eímear Noone's compositions to be released from "Warlords of Draenor."  It's a piece from the zone of Gorgrond, entitled, "The Foundry."  

For those of you who might be keeping track, for the past nine years Eimear has been my partner in everything, our finest collaboration being our son Eliam, born last September.

But both of us being a part of the composition team for "Warlords of Draenor"is also something to be celebrated.   The Blizzard collaboration of writers, artists, directors, composers, sound designers…  a bottomless list of exceptional talent; what a joy it has been to be able to work together at such a fantastic level of creativity.

This project also marks the first time Eimear has lent her own formidable composition talents into the "World of Warcraft" franchise.  Again, for those in the know, Eimear has been a part of the team as a conductor and orchestrater since the first game - which makes this all the more special.

A big thanks to the entire Blizzard team for bringing us along for the ride, and a special thanks to our leader in all things, the exceptional Russell Brower for giving us this opportunity to shine.

Are you a Video Game Music fan?  Join our mailing list us through the box at the very top right, and we will send you a free MP3.  Just let us know if you'd like a track from "Baldur's Gate, The Dark Alliance II," or the bonus track from Eimear's "Hibernian" Mini EP.  Just let us know which you would like.

Help Eimear and I support Orchestral Music! Vote for us today!

Hi Fellow Music Fans.

This blog posting has a very specific message:  We need your vote now!

To continue bringing great orchestral music to the concert hall, we are competing for a $250K "Small Business Grant" from Chase Bank.  We have a little over a week to secure 250 votes for our company, Twelve O'clock Arts, in order to progress to the next round of the competition.

If you already know and love Eimear's work for Blizzard, Zelda, her classical, film and video game concerts, go directly to this link and vote now!

https://www.missionmainstreetgrants.com/business/detail/51610

The rest of this newsletter will be dedicated to describing just a taste of what we have planned for the upcoming year. 

Our Goal:  Exposing New Audiences to the Symphony Through Multimedia, Video Game and Film Music. You may know Eimear Noone from her video game music concerts, but these are only the latest adventures in a long musical journey.  Eimear Noone (and her partners at Twelve o'clock Arts) have spent a lifetime dedicated to performing and promoting orchestral music of all kinds! A conductor since the age of 15, by age of 21, Eimear had co-founded her own ensemble, "The Dublin City Concert Orchestra."  With nothing except a sheer force of will, she sold out a series of concerts at Dublin's National Concert Hall that were dedicated to performing film scores as well as classic repertoire that was used in this films.  Although much more common now, an orchestral concert dedicated to "film music" was unheard of within the classical establishment at the time. Flash forward to the past few years where now hundreds of thousands of fans have seen Eimear onstage conducting video game music at venue such as The Sydney Opera House, Madison Square Garden, and The Greek Theater (To name but a few).  Likewise, she's lead countless venerable ensembles such as the Sydney, Dallas, Baltimore, Colorado, Pacific and Houston Symphonies; The Philadelphia Orchestra, and The Royal Philharmonic. Those who have attended these concerts know, the music from these video games are bold, brash and every bit as dynamic as the traditional repertoire. They are the classical music of our day. Most importantly however, at a time when orchestras are struggling to find a sustainable audience, these concerts of video game music regularly sell out. And what do the symphony managers ask Eimear at these video game music concerts, when they see full houses treating their orchestras like rock stars?  They ask, "How do we get this audience back to the concert hall to hear the classics?" This is where our new adventure begins. Eimear rehearsing "This is Ireland," her St. Patrick's Day Multimedia Celebration, featuring Pierce Brosnan Our New Project!:  Bringing Video Game Music, Stunning Visuals, and Classic Repertoire Together in One Multimedia Celebration. At Twelve O'clock Arts we love all types of orchestral music, regardless of the origin.  It can be a game score written last week or a symphony from the 1800's - to us they are all pure magic. Our key motivation is the desire to share any and all of these in a setting that resembles the multi-media extravaganzas that our audiences have come to expect from Eimear:  Beautiful moving images, synchronized to every beat and phrase of the music - as only her expert conducting can allow.  If it's the score from a movie, every moment is synchronized to the composer's intent for the film.  Likewise a game score. This is how we are used to seeing video game concerts - but we want to take this to a new level! What if we could take all of this talent one step further?  What if we could bring all the wonderful multimedia technology available from Broadway, rock concerts, and the movies to the concert stage? Imagine a 3D enveloping experiences, dancing dragon holograms and more, all interacting with Eimear and the orchestra.  That's what we have planned! To execute this vision we have teamed up with Broadway producer David L. Garfinkle, who's productions of "Ghost" and "Spiderman" have already rewritten the rules for what can be presented on a stage. We've also teamed up with some yet to be announced top game composers and game companies - you will absolutely know them! Together, our team is going to rewrite the rules of what you can do with the orchestra! At the core of all of this, though, is the same excellence of symphonic performance that the audience has come to expect whenever Eimear takes the stage.  There will be your favorite video game scores, performed to picture, but also, video interpretations of some of the great classics that influenced the video game scores.  We are not quite ready to release all the secrets we have planned, except to say the fans will not be disappointed! But we can't do any of this without your help!  We need your vote for "Twelve O'clock Arts!  Please click on the link below and vote now!  Help us get to the next level! Vote for Twelve O'clock Arts!

Songs of the Dragon, Vol. 2 - Live now on iTunes and Many Digital Stores

Buy "Song's of the Dragon, Vol. 2, Featuring Music from Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance 2."

Read below for information on a free song from the CD!



Back in 2003 I composed the music for the video game, "Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance 2."  It was my first adventure composing for XBOX and Play-stations.

Still,  I was far from new to games.  At the time this was also my thirteenth journey into "Dungeons and Dragons" and "Middle Earth," having written more than a dozen previous TSR game scores.  Other scores from this period included the TV special "Dragonstrike," and the games "Planescape, A Guide to the Outlands.", "Ravenloft, A Light in the Belfry," "Hail the Heroes" and "Terror Trax" (among others).  

It was a great ride, but one of my great regrets was that despite having the best technology of the day, the scores were not up to what I knew I could do with a live orchestra.  The budgets just were not there for these games.

So when I embarked on "Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance 2," I had decided things were going to be different.  I was going to record the score with a live ensemble, even if it meant paying for it myself and making nothing.  All I wanted was to hear the music as I had intended.

But as is often said, men plan and G-d laughs.

I won't go into all the details of the debacle that followed, but you can read a bit about it here:  Interplay Entertainment Facing Bankruptcy.  The short story was this:  I kind of got left holding the financial bag for the music, and what should have been the greatest score of my career became a financial nightmare - at no fault to all the wonderful people that I was working with directly at Interplay.

The upside to all this turmoil was that at the end of the day I ended up keeping the rights to my music.

Flash forward to about two and a half years ago when I decided that despite the effort it might take, I needed to go back to the raw musical material and recreate my "Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance 2" score anew.  I still didn't have the budget for a full orchestra (maybe some day I'll win the lottery and this will be my first project) but with the help of some new tools such as "The Vienna Symphonic Instrument," I thought I might be able to create a viable representation of what I wanted to hear.

The barriers were fairly high:  Many of the sounds I used back then came from synthesizers that have long since been recycled for scrap metal  The sequencer files were not compatible with my modern gear.  It was also next to impossible to even determine which versions of the music were the ones from the game and which were discarded demos - so many of the mixes were lost.

Inspired by the many fans who had contacted me wanting the score, over that next two and a half years, whenever I had downtime, I went through the process of recreating every track of the score from scratch - or at least the 9 tracks that could be recreated.  I decided to release the music on what is now my second "Dungeons and Dragons" music release:  "Songs of the Dragon Vol. 2."  The CD also includes two tracks from another project that I thought complimented the D & D scores.

As a thank you to all the fans of the game who have contacted me, this link will download one of the recreated tracks - "The End Title Theme."

Download:  "The Battle Rages" aka "Baldur's Gate:  Dark Alliance 2 End Title"

You can also preview or buy the entire CD from this link:

Bloodmire Manor - Remix, Redux, Redux

One of the challenges of being a creative type is that by definition one is never satisfied with their work.  As I like to say, nothing is ever finished, only abandoned.

In this spirit, I wanted to share my latest remix from "Baldur's Gate, The Dark Alliance II," a composition entitled:  "Bloodmire Manor."

This was a really hard score for me;  Not due to the music nor people I was working with, but because while I was working on the project, the employer went belly up.  The resulting budget constraints dictated that the score that ended up in the game was my version of a well produced demo, not what I considered a finished product.  This really hurt!

Over the past few years I have slowly been remixing all the original scores (from 2004).  In  some cases, I've recorded live orchestra, in others, as in the composition below, I took the original files and recreated them using modern sample libraries like the Vienna Symphonic Instrument.  This is an interesting example for those who want to hear how music technology has evolved in the last 9 years (it's 2013 when I am writing this).

Here's the remix:

And here's the original version:   

http://www.midiotmusic.com/BloodmireOriginal.mp3

What cue would you like me to revisit next?  Leave a comment.

CSG

Quantum of Solace Video Game and Trailer

Back in 2008, my writing partner Simone and I created a special version of "The James Bond Theme" for the Quantum of Solace Video Game and Trailer.   Here's one of the many trailers they cut:

This piece was a blast to produce!  During the recording session we had a great brass section, the amazing Gregg Bissonette on drums, the intrepid John Rodd to record everything to ProTools, and then I took the tracks home to add my guitar and mix everything.

But there were too many tracks for my ProTools rig!  I had to composite everything, making certain compromises along the way.

Flash forward five years, and eight 3.4 Intel Processors later - Yesterday I decided to remix the cue to take advantage of my new production tools.  You can hear the result through the link below:

Let me know what you think!

CSG