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Music Contribution Guidelines


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As Music Lead on 0.A.D., I decided to start a thread here to explain to would-be contributors how my desicion making in that area will work.

The few basic requirements of quality-assurance must be:
- Ability to create tracks of similar production-value to my score in terms of sampling, sound, mix and mastering.
- Ability to record live instruments to match my score and avoid the cliche, 100% sample-based score everyone else has.
- A certain understanding of the game and the concepts set for each civilization.
- Availability to make any requested changes by me / the team.
- Ability to deliver product as a high-resolution .wav file.
- An understanding of and willingness to work under Creative Commons, share alike license.

I will generally not work with anyone who doesn't match these criteria, although in extreme cases I might consider accepting a MIDI file and doing the production myself, on a free-time basis.
I will generally not accept pre-existing tracks, unless by some chance they fit remarkably well, or can be tweaked to fit.

I understand that many young composers are attracted to this kind of project, but in the interest of delivering a good, even-quality product, I must be very picky with music contributions.

Composers who feel they meet the criteria and wish to contribute are welcome to contact me directly via omri (@) omrilahav.com, or post on this thread.
Please include a link to your work and a brief description of your experience.

Good luck,

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I can manage everything except for the live recording of ethnic instruments since I don't own any. I've recently bought a sound card which allows me to record instruments but I don't have the instruments :D We'll see how this goes, I will give my best to fulfill all other criteria to the max. I don't see a problem with using VST as a replacement for some live instruments. There are rather good VST simulators which fulfill the role of a live instrument to a certain level. I was just wondering is there any chance that you may actually accept VST based tracks?

P.S. Is there a deadline for applying music contributions?

Edited by bosnian_dragon
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I am firmly determined to avoid any tracks that are 100% VST, especially when all the rest of the tracks will have live solo instruments - it will stick out like a sore thumb.

If you can't record live instruments but your tracks are really good otherwise,

I will consider taking playbacks and sheet music, and recording the solo lines myself on a free-time basis, however I can't guarantee exactly when I will have the time to do it.

There is no deadline per-se, but the sooner the better as I'm making tracks myself, so at some point I won't actually need any contributions.

The best thing to do if you want to contribute is to email me a sample of your best work to OmriMusic (@) Hotmail.com

(In the email subject please include "0.A.D. music submission").

Omri

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I've just listened to your demo track for Iberians during peacetime, and I personally think it sounds good with the live guitars and I see your point with live instruments. However, it sounds more like a classical composition, which has a lot more contemporary sound than it should. It doesn't create a proper feeling for me (regarding the main theme of the game), actually I rather feel like I'm in renaissance and not in 0 AD. But that's just my opinion and my personal feeling of course ;)

I will try to compose something and send it to you as soon as I can.

Edited by bosnian_dragon
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  • 1 month later...

I've just listened to your demo track for Iberians during peacetime, and I personally think it sounds good with the live guitars and I see your point with live instruments. However, it sounds more like a classical composition, which has a lot more contemporary sound than it should. It doesn't create a proper feeling for me (regarding the main theme of the game), actually I rather feel like I'm in renaissance and not in 0 AD. But that's just my opinion and my personal feeling of course ;)

Hmm, I'm afraid I'm inclined to agree with bosnian_dragon here. A bit too contemporary, and also I find that when the VST orchestral sounds come in, the effect of the guitar is somewhat spoiled. I think there is too big a difference between the acoustic guitar and the orchestral sounds. For me they don't quite fit together. I think the track should either be mostly acoustic and intimate sounding, or mostly orchestral and epic. My favourite bit is the acoustic beginning, although I also quite like the orchestral bit towards the end. I think the problem is that the orchestra sounds too small, being in the background of an acoustic guitar.

Just my opinion though.

I'm not sure what I can come up with myself, but I might give something a go. I may be able to do something for the Celts. I don't have so much in the way of orchestral VSTs myself (although I think I have some somewhere), so it'll be more based on recorded instruments and messing around with effects and stuff.

I'm also up for recording some real instrument parts to add to the tracks. I can play violin, harpsichord (can be made to sound quite harp like), electric and acoustic ukuleles (yes, I play heavy metal ukulele), bass guitar (fretless, fretted, fretless acoustic), and a bit of drums. I also have an Elektronika EM-25 Analog String Synth, which isn't that realistic a string sound, but provides nice warm synth strings.

Are we going for more of an orchestral feel overall? I feel that some of the pieces, especially peace time, could be quite mellow and not have such a heavy instrumentation (like Persian Peace, for example). I don't know much about the music around the 0 A. D. time period. Do we have many historical sources, or is it mostly guesswork? I don't even know what instruments they had back then. If we have orchestral sounds, which are totally not historically accurate, but quite fitting, can we also have electronic sounds? I personally prefer music that is openly electronic over music that is pretending to be an orchestra, but is really blatantly VSTs. Although I do like epic orchestral metal with its blatant non-use of orchestra. But a friend of mine once got some woodwind players to play some metal, and we played orchestral style metal with proper instruments, and it was pretty cool. But I digress.

Sebastian.

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I would like to set a few things straight -

first of all, while the game is historically based - the score simply can't be limited to 0.A.D. period music for a few reasons:

We have no credible idea what it sounded like, and, an entirely chamber based score simply wouldn't feel right on an epic war game.

To be clear about my current peace tracks - they are not going to be the only peace tracks included, I fully intend to have the peace tracks vary in size.

However, the concept is indeed, that the orchestra is going to be the underline throughout.

With regards to recording live instruments - it is very important to me.

Sebastian, with regards to your comment about "fooling around with effects", I think anything more then plain reverb is inappropriate for this production.

Once again, if you wish to contribute - email me your pieces, if they meet the criteria I set at the start of this thread.

Thanks,

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  • 4 weeks later...

Hi all,

I'm a french canadien composer that would love to help your team to make one of the most beautiful score on the planet ^^.

I'm 31 years old, i learned music in St-Lawrence college in Montreal (Jazz, music history and composition). I played in a professional band for 10 years before returning to my birthplace to live a more healty way (sex drugs and rock and roll wasnt for me after all ;)).

I'm almost able to play any kind of instrument. In high school i was the backup for every instrument that was missing in our harmony orchestra. So i played french horn,trombonne,trumpet, clarinet, saxophone, tuba, percussions of all kind, piano and bass. Since then, i also learned irish flute and portugese guitarra.

My main instrument still are the electric bass, guitar and piano but i could be able to play some of the others if i have to. Or to find some really good musicians here.

As a composer, i've been working on a lot of musical's soundtrack for some canadian cast since 1997.Those soundtrack included the lion king, les miserables, scrooge, the little mermaid, Aïda, Mamma Mia,joseph and the amazing technicolor dreamcoat, Jeckyll and Hyde and many others.

For composing i'm using Encore and Sibelius (i just moved to sibelius this year so i still use Encore when i have to be more efficient quickly) with Cubase 6 as my DAW.

I have a lot of very good vst instrument that could help the songs from 0 A.D. that i heard on this site, sounds even more realistic. (EWQL/Vienna/Komplete/etc.)

For recording i have some focusrite liquid 56 with a lot of preamp and microphone and a lot of real instruments.

I cannot put any of my work directly on the web due to some legal issues that could occurs with my employers that doesnt want their soundtrack to be distributed anywhere on the web but i could send in private to mister Lahav some samples of my work by email if he wanted to.

I hope to have some good news from your team. In any case i'll play it cause i'm sure it will be an amazing game.

0 A.D. will be a really really great games, with some "stunning" music on top of it, it will be almost greater.

BTW, sorry for all the mistake that i have made in my post, as i said i'm a french canadian so english isnt my first langage. But i'm better in understanding it than writing it.....

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Hi Mphunky, your skills sound very promissing and will certainly be put to good use in this score :)

Feel free to email me the samples to OmriMusic (@) Hotmail.com.

Let me know which instruments you'd like to record live for this score, and I'll email you the relevant tracks!

Omri

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Hi both of you! XD

I'm really glad to have some good news from you guys! :)

Well i'm actually out of town for some time with one of my band but when i'll come back at my house in a few days, i'll send you some sample of what i can do and how my samplers sounds.

Maybe i'm wrong but Mr. Lahav probably have already his own music in mind for 0 A.D. and know where he want to go with the musical part of the project. I was only expecting to help his songs sounds more realistic by recording few real instrument or making some "rearangement" (dont know if its a word in english :P) of his midi files with my samplers libraries But if he want others persons to contribute musically with their own composition i could probably help also, but i'll have to listen to some more track to try to "copy" the essence of the songs to sound familiar. Btw i saw some of your youtube's video and you're a great guitar player. ^^

My own compostion could be more appropriate for "the last alliance" project if wildfire think of restarting it someday.....but that is another story ;)

I'll contact mr Lahav as soon as i come back in town.

Thanx again.......sounds very promising to work with your team!

Edited by Mphunky
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  • 4 weeks later...

Hi everyone,

I just sent some samples of my work to mister Lahav yesterday so i'll wait until i have some news from him. I couldnt put all the stuff that i would becauseof the contract that i signed with the producers that hired me but i send him some work in progress from some musicals and a little jam i've made the first day that i received my new cubase 6 and my new sampler.

I hope he will appreciate and find me a place in your team. ;)

Edited by Mphunky
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  • 1 month later...
  • 1 month later...

Just noticed that this topic is pinned and there is item:


An understanding of and willingness to work under Creative Commons, non-commercial share alike license.

'non-commercial' is wrong part, because we use cc-by-sa license, not cc-by-nc-sa (which is not free cultural license). So I propose to change sentence to:


An understanding of and willingness to work under [url="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/"]Creative Commons Attribution Share-alike license[/url].

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  • 4 weeks later...

Hi,

I'm Marty Lake, french electro music composer. I'm a very big fan of Game OST since I'm very young, and I would love to work for 0AD project. I can't record any "true" instrument track, but I can reach a very good quality when I want to. I've already composed various tracks for a Musical.

I'm looking for informations about what have already be done, and what's need to be done ?

Musicaly yours,

Marty

PS: as my "portfolio", here my soundcloud page :

 

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  • 3 weeks later...

PS: as my "portfolio", here my soundcloud page : http://www.soundcloud.com/marty-lake

Marty,

Thanks for your interest in 0.A.D.!

I've listened to your portfolio, and you have some very nice electronic music, but that's a far cry from what this project needs.

Do you have any works I can listen to in the areas of orchestral music, world music, or anything else that might be relevant for 0.A.D.?

If you are not sure what kind of music I'm referring to, please listen to the existing score right here.

Thanks,

Just noticed that this topic is pinned and there is item:


An understanding of and willingness to work under Creative Commons, non-commercial share alike license.

'non-commercial' is wrong part, because we use cc-by-sa license, not cc-by-nc-sa (which is not free cultural license). So I propose to change sentence to:


An understanding of and willingness to work under [url="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/"]Creative Commons Attribution Share-alike license[/url].

Fixed, thanks :)

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  • 3 months later...

Hi

I'm a young sound engineer and would be interested in participating. But I cannot compose^^

I'm working in a sound studio and would be able to record quiet a few things, probably I could even find a small orchestra to record, but that's not sure.

if you want to listen to something that I helped to record and mix visit http://www.ideeundkl...io/einefrau.php and listen to the sound samples.

In a few days I should also be able to send you a orchestra recording of me (but that's not finished yet, so I must not give it to you now^^)

so if you still need someone to record (and of course also mix the staff) some scores, write me a message

Xetolosch

Edited by Xetolosch
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  • 4 years later...

Someone pointed me out to this forum thread. It’s mention in this thread that when people can record the instruments themselves, that’s the ideal, but when that is not the case, OmriLahav is happy to look into midi files and scores. you can check some examples of scores I did in the summer in imslp.org. https://imslp.org/wiki/As_I_Look_Towards_the_Margin,_I_see_a_Glimmer..._(Morgado,_Tiago_Morais) this is an example of a piece in the style of steve reich/Terry Riley. and then I have another file, which is more like modern classical (or pop much with influences of XVII and XIX century classical music - so, baroque, and romantic music), which you can listen here http://imslp.org/wiki/Sorrow_(Morgado,_Tiago_Morais) both examples were written very spontaneously and quickly, and I think I can easily come up with tons of scores in the style of what you care looking for the game, and sending them to OmriLahav, just like he point's out in the given mail. looking forward, cheers. tiago

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Hi @tmm88 :wavey:

For my taste As I Look Towards the Margin, I see a Glimmer... is much to repetitiv (reminds me of techno) and also lacks a harmoneous ending.

I like Sorrow though. I'm still a bit irritated by that MIDI sound (feels like console game music ;) ) and is feels slightly like a gothic theme (I'm quite sure I'm not using the correct terms here :/ ).

I'm not making any implications about if this track will be used for 0 A.D. and don't intend to do: That's @OmriLahav decision to make and I hope you understand that we are very greatfull for his extraordinary contributions to 0 A.D. and value his decisions and quality of work.

However I still want to give you feedback since I like that second song of yours quite a lot and would be exited to her it played with life instruments (y)

Thanks for sharing your work with us :thank_you2:

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i made a new piece in the style of sorrow. sorrow is a bit about classical modern kind of stuff. see olafur arnalds, see max Richter for instance. as I walk towards a margin, as a techno feel. but it's much more like minimalistic classical music in the style of Terry Riley and steve reich

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