# Star Trek: TNG



## Daisser (Dec 27, 2016)

I know there's a lot of Star Wars buzz right now with the new movie but I finished a mock up of Alex Courage's / Goldsmith's TNG theme. I couldn't find the full score written out so I had to listen to a few recordings and use a piano reduction I have of it. Your thoughts would be much appreciated!!

I do give a shout out for Carrie Fisher though, you will be missed :(


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## markleake (Dec 28, 2016)

I've always loved these Star Trek title themes. TNG, Voyager, DS9... all three of them are quite good.

Yours isn't a faithful reproduction, but its admittedly hard to reproduce something accurately, let alone a piece that people will be so familiar with. Good work.


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## Daisser (Dec 29, 2016)

markleake said:


> I've always loved these Star Trek title themes. TNG, Voyager, DS9... all three of them are quite good.
> 
> Yours isn't a faithful reproduction, but its admittedly hard to reproduce something accurately, let alone a piece that people will be so familiar with. Good work.



Yes, it's a rough one because I couldn't find the score. I listened to the TV version a millions times but this one has some of the Telarc version in it. What do you think of it as a variation and of my creation's production quality? Any tips to improve would be appreciated!


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## markleake (Dec 29, 2016)

Daisser said:


> What do you think of it as a variation and of my creation's production quality? Any tips to improve would be appreciated!


I think it lacks the crispness of the original. A lot of the instruments you've used seem to be blurring the notes (may be a legato thing?), and the dynamics sound a bit unnatural or forced sometimes. There are some instruments that stand out too much (either too loud or an issue with blending/room?), like the percussion. The brass I think struggles to match how I hear it should be played in my head. The strings often have flourishes that don't blend in too well, and I think sometimes you are missing some string parts or something where I expect them. I'd have to go listen to the original to compare it properly.

Hope that doesn't sound too negative. You did ask! I don't think I'd be able to do any better myself, not without a fair bit of effort anyway. And to do it without the score... I always admire the effort that goes into that kind of work.


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## Daisser (Dec 30, 2016)

markleake said:


> I think it lacks the crispness of the original. A lot of the instruments you've used seem to be blurring the notes (may be a legato thing?), and the dynamics sound a bit unnatural or forced sometimes. There are some instruments that stand out too much (either too loud or an issue with blending/room?), like the percussion. The brass I think struggles to match how I hear it should be played in my head. The strings often have flourishes that don't blend in too well, and I think sometimes you are missing some string parts or something where I expect them. I'd have to go listen to the original to compare it properly.
> 
> Hope that doesn't sound too negative. You did ask! I don't think I'd be able to do any better myself, not without a fair bit of effort anyway. And to do it without the score... I always admire the effort that goes into that kind of work.



First, I do appreciate you taking the time for a response. Yes your response definitely classifies as negative as you basically said the whole thing is crap, lol. But, as you said, it's what I asked for, and I wouldn't want you to sugar coat it.

I haven't gotten any other replies which probably means others aggree to an extent but are nice about it. Can anyone else chime in and let me know if I have Goldsmith turning over in his grave on this one?

I honestly have no idea how to take your comments to fix this. I could write a paper on all the work that had gone into this hobby and this work (A/B 3 different recordings of st, all the verta classes I've taken, countless forum post topics reviewed, the years of music theory study and playing ability with the piano, 10 hour days on weekends working on it, wtc) and that's near the best of what I could do. 

I will take this work to one of the mockup teachers I work online with but personally I think that I and many here suffer by not having access to a teacher that could come to their home to get really specific and consistent in help.

I also have to wonder if I just don't have the ear or ability to do this stuff at any professional level as well. I'm venting here yes, but I have to "hold it in" on most of what I do in life and just cant on this.


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## Daisser (Dec 30, 2016)

markleake said:


> I think it lacks the crispness of the original. A lot of the instruments you've used seem to be blurring the notes (may be a legato thing?), and the dynamics sound a bit unnatural or forced sometimes. There are some instruments that stand out too much (either too loud or an issue with blending/room?), like the percussion. The brass I think struggles to match how I hear it should be played in my head. The strings often have flourishes that don't blend in too well, and I think sometimes you are missing some string parts or something where I expect them. I'd have to go listen to the original to compare it properly.
> 
> Hope that doesn't sound too negative. You did ask! I don't think I'd be able to do any better myself, not without a fair bit of effort anyway. And to do it without the score... I always admire the effort that goes into that kind of work.



As I read this a bit later in the morning I want to makes sure you understand that my response is in no way directed negatively at you, just my own frustrations in how to get from what I just posted to something Blakus or Verta would create.


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## markleake (Dec 30, 2016)

Daisser said:


> As I read this a bit later in the morning I want to makes sure you understand that my response is in no way directed negatively at you, just my own frustrations in how to get from what I just posted to something Blakus or Verta would create.


No worries at all. I think its hard work to closely match real orchestras with sample libraries, so don't take my comments as disparaging your work at all. Like I said, I wasn't sitting listening to your piece and the original to compare them directly, so I may be off with some of my feedback. I'm sure when other people listen to it they will hear something different to me. If it makes you feel better, I did like what you put together. 
Listening to it again, is there some tuned percussion missing? Also, maybe the string runs don't stand out as much as I thought... it could just be that the strings are a little behind the beat?


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## Saxer (Dec 30, 2016)

I'm missing the brass attacks... the Daaa DaDaDaaa instead of GuaaaHuuaaHaaaa. Question of selecting the right articulation I think. A lot of your brass notes are simply longer than the original... starts with the first horn motive (at 0:30): there are gaps between notes in the original and it switches between tenuto and a lush staccato (at least note 2,5,6,7 are short). And the slow attack in the strings makes the main melody in the bridge part washy. They should be the lead instruments there.
I don't know which libraries you used but all in all it sounds to me like too much sustain patches. I got similar results when trying to use the Albions for melodic stuff: the shorts are mostly too short and the longs too slow. Something like Adventure Brass could help. But you have to take care of note length.
Exept that: good work!


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## markleake (Dec 30, 2016)

Saxer said:


> I'm missing the brass attacks


^ This. That's what I meant by the legato issues, the dynamics sounding forced, and the strings sounding behind. It all comes down to the missing attacks. Sorry I didn't describe it very well earlier.


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## AlexanderSchiborr (Jan 1, 2017)

Daisser said:


> I know there's a lot of Star Wars buzz right now with the new movie but I finished a mock up of Alex Courage's / Goldsmith's TNG theme. I couldn't find the full score written out so I had to listen to a few recordings and use a piano reduction I have of it. Your thoughts would be much appreciated!!
> 
> I do give a shout out for Carrie Fisher though, you will be missed :(




Hi Daisser,
First happy new year to you. Cool track you have done there. It features cool moments. Most of all I like the beginning with that open wide strings until 54 seconds. It is very atmospheric and spacey and gives a great sense of sci fi. 
53 seconds - 1:06 min:
Where you are introducing the main form of the main theme it gets a bit all over the place in regards of your orchestrational choices.
First: Your trumpet needs a bit more refinements, so that the short passing notes between the longs get a bit more of definition and bite so that they are clear in their intention. Maybe you could try out using a different articulation instead of working with the same one you are using for the long notes?
Another thing I noticed is the orchestration in the lower registers that he imo overorchestrated it there. The Horns are playing a rhythmic figure somehow in the same range where your trombones / Tuba are holding the bass notes. This causes a very dense and heavy weighted low end orchestration there. Better would be that you let the horns playing the rhytmic figure a way more in the upper registers at a lower dynamic device. Also the low trombones / Tuba holded Notes make it feel very "heavy" done there.
Either way, if you want to keep the trombones / Tuba like this, put the horns a way more up to make your orchestration a bit more clear and balanced.
Also your string runs there are a way too loud imo. They overpower and disturb the melodic line a lot.
My opinion: I would take out the trombones and tuba at all and let the play the runs at a lower dynamic.

1:06 - 1:09: Now that feels a bit empty with your trumpet playing forte and the lower brass is totally not clear what it does there underpinning the trumpets. From the aspect of drama it really falls apart at that point while in the original it remains the majestic and strength flow or even intensified it. I also think that your your violins in the octave above doubling the Trumpets need more of a definitive marcato accented or tenuto playing. I guess you used there a sustained / legato patch.

1:11 min: As you continue using the high violins playing all the time, the B section feels ok, but lacks of also a bit of color change from the brassy driven A Section to a romantic driven b Section with more prominently strings. The strings there need also a lot of vibrato and accent on the notes so that they "sing" and give "epxression" to the long holding notes.

Mixing wise I feel it has a bit too much reverb for my taste.

You know overall I like your piece and it shows you spent some time on it, and it is very good intent and great exercises you did there, so thank you for sharing. I guess you wanted to do a bit your own thing with the theme and not just to replicate the original which is totally cool. To make something new out of that theme isn´t easy at all, I know that because it is not at all a beginners piece to work on or start on.

I don´t know how I would do it, maybe first I would start loading up a piano and listen out the melody and chords of the theme and trying then when I am familiar with the harmonic language to experiment how to make my own thing of it. E.g. to reharmonize certain parts, trying out and substitute new chords and see what it is like. Then I would composer on the piano a sketch for an a section, then b - section and decide afterwards what to do with the orchestration in regards how my piano sketch sounds like.


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## mducharme (Jan 1, 2017)

Daisser said:


> Yes, it's a rough one because I couldn't find the score. I listened to the TV version a millions times but this one has some of the Telarc version in it. What do you think of it as a variation and of my creation's production quality? Any tips to improve would be appreciated!



Two things, Daisser:

- If you take the Smalley orchestration course, he gives several pages of the main title (though not the entire thing).
- There is a 'film score rundown' by Bill Wrobel, since the score is under copyright he basically gets around this by describing in words what is notated in every bar, what the note values are. It's somewhat hard to read but if you are careful you can follow through it: http://www.filmscorerundowns.net/goldsmith/startrek.pdf


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## Daisser (Jan 1, 2017)

AlexanderSchiborr said:


> eds a bit more refinements, so that





AlexanderSchiborr said:


> Hi Daisser,
> First happy new year to you. Cool track you have done there. It features cool moments. Most of all I like the beginning with that open wide strings until 54 seconds. It is very atmospheric and spacey and gives a great sense of sci fi.
> 53 seconds - 1:06 min:
> Where you are introducing the main form of the main theme it gets a bit all over the place in regards of your orchestrational choices.
> ...



Happy New Year! That's some excellent feedback that I will apply to my work right away. I appreciate the time you took to write that. I picked this piece because it has a lot of emotion, is agile, and makes use of expressive short articulations throughout, all areas I need to improve upon for my own work (oh yeah, and I love Star Trek). I have the samples I need to do this fairly well (SM Brass, Adventure Brass, HWS / B, Albions, etc), it's just a matter of the choice and arrangement. 

Based on your feedback maybe I should try to be more faithful to the original as it would give me an easier benchmark to match my mockup on. Not to mention the variation choices in the original are, well, awesome.

As far the comments on sustains I will review that throughout. I'm actually using SM trumpet on the lead, so I can look at the phrasing and give the short notes more bite. Maybe Agitato strings might help in making the string lead have more character as well as re-record the lines a few different ways.

For my room, I use delay panning on instruments and I route each section to their own Spaces bus. I can pull that in a bit. I also wonder if my audio setup in my room messes with my choices on balance of lows in mixes, which is a hard one to fix.

I used this below as a base, but wrote it out in Sonar. Writing it out in Finale first might make it far easier to see orchestration choices and section balance.

http://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title...M_3qI1Iup9YP3exfVMav9KfVxczcBY9CBoaAtwh8P8HAQ

I'll get to work on it!

By the way, your music is really good and a pleasure to listen to!


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## Daisser (Jan 1, 2017)

mducharme said:


> Two things, Daisser:
> 
> - If you take the Smalley orchestration course, he gives several pages of the main title (though not the entire thing).
> - There is a 'film score rundown' by Bill Wrobel, since the score is under copyright he basically gets around this by describing in words what is notated in every bar, what the note values are. It's somewhat hard to read but if you are careful you can follow through it: http://www.filmscorerundowns.net/goldsmith/startrek.pdf



This is really helpful and might help me solve problem areas, thank you great find!


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## Daisser (Jan 2, 2017)

AlexanderSchiborr said:


> Hi Daisser,
> First happy new year to you. Cool track you have done there. It features cool moments. Most of all I like the beginning with that open wide strings until 54 seconds. It is very atmospheric and spacey and gives a great sense of sci fi.
> 53 seconds - 1:06 min:
> Where you are introducing the main form of the main theme it gets a bit all over the place in regards of your orchestrational choices.
> ...



Hi, good morning! I've taken your feedback (any others here) and applied it to my piece. I've added more short articulations on the brass and strings, made the B section more emotional, lowered the percussion / lower brass relative to the mix, and took away some reverb. I still might re-arrange what I came up with, but at this point I tried working on the balance as is. Soundcloud should now reflect my most current version. I would appreciate if if you could give it another listen and let me know if this addresses some of points you noted!


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## AlexanderSchiborr (Jan 2, 2017)

Daisser said:


> Hi, good morning! I've taken your feedback (any others here) and applied it to my piece. I've added more short articulations on the brass and strings, made the B section more emotional, lowered the percussion / lower brass relative to the mix, and took away some reverb. I still might re-arrange what I came up with, but at this point I tried working on the balance as is. Soundcloud should now reflect my most current version. I would appreciate if if you could give it another listen and let me know if this addresses some of points you noted!



Hi Daisser, 
Cool, thats great. I will take a listen in a few minutes and let you know my thoughts (just back from some groceries). Ähm, Do you have still the old version somewhere available? Just to have an a / B comparison?


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## Andrew_m (Jan 2, 2017)

Lovely! What was the brass library(s) ?


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## Daisser (Jan 2, 2017)

AlexanderSchiborr said:


> Hi Daisser,
> Cool, thats great. I will take a listen in a few minutes and let you know my thoughts (just back from some groceries). Ähm, Do you have still the old version somewhere available? Just to have an a / B comparison?



This is the old one I believe -


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## Daisser (Jan 2, 2017)

Andrew_m said:


> Lovely! What was the brass library(s) ?



Thanks! I used SM, Adventure Brass, and HWB.


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## Andrew_m (Jan 2, 2017)

Daisser said:


> Thanks! I used SM, Adventure Brass, and HWB.


Non-abbreviated would be helpful


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## Daisser (Jan 2, 2017)

Andrew_m said:


> Non-abbreviated would be helpful



Sure, np. Sample Modeling Brass (SM) and Music Sampling's Adventure Brass are the backbone of it. They are similar in how they play allowing for very brass like lines if you good at using them. I'm still working on that. I also used HWB - East West's Hollywood Brass. Even the gold version sounds amazing and you get a ton of articulations. Play 5 is also a major improvement for usage as well.


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## AlexanderSchiborr (Jan 2, 2017)

Hi Daisser,

Much better, I like those sweet strings a lot which are
really close. Also the orchestration seems a bit more open
and not so bulky, I think thats works much better now.

Well done. Still I have more thoughts.

Here are my notes after listening on my studio speakers:

1. French Horns and Trumpets (30 seconds - 50 seconds around):

They are way still too dry in comparison to the rest of your orchestra
As you work with sample modeling you have to put them a way back with
increasing your wet signal. I dont have SM Brass, but I read from others
how they put it back in the room. Either way the brass needs really a bit
more of that wideness also and a tad more reverb, maybe you should work with more early reflections
and reverb.
There is a trick with the Horns, you can use corrective EQ in the lower mids
to fake a bit of distance, just notch out a bit, just bit of the body, that helps
(around 350 Hz around)
Similiar that technique can be applied to trumpets at different Spots of course.
In the later parts not to obvious because the orchestra is more occupied.

2. Your High Violins sound much better, but:

They are a bit late in timing sometimes here and there. They have a natural attacks and they come a bit too late.
Move them a bit to the left, just a little, that should do the job then, e.g. at 1:39 etc, there you
clearly here that everything is a bit swimming around the thing, also noticable at 58 seconds and 1:07
(actually the track is on repeat here). Overall I would say, yes a bit to the left


3. The Ending:

At 1:50:500 milliseconds there are your violins doubling the the trumpet fanares
and then they just lose volume on the next notes in the mix which sounds a bit strange.
You could maybe check that spot?

4. The Part at 1:11 min:

Where are your lower strings? I can hear them but they are very behind the rest. The
Timpani is very strong overall.

5. The Tubular Bell

On the right stereo sounds cool but could also Sit a bit more in the sound and a way back in the
Sound as it is a melodic prc and natural sits more back in the orchestra.

6. Your Cymbals

Cut a bit of the very high frequencies, just slightly at 13khz as this helps them to sit a bit more
in the mix. 4.48 khz could be also a spot to look, there is a lot of harsh cymbal signal.

But overall really a cool track and I enjoyed it. Hope my ideas will help you a bit.


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## markleake (Jan 2, 2017)

I like it better now also. @AlexanderSchiborr has some very good detailed advice which I agree with... there are some problems with various instruments not sounding correct with the others. Although that can be personal taste I suppose.

Speaking of personal taste, I don't like some of the lead brass instruments. I think that is because they are SM or AB instruments and are very forward in the mix... I've never been a fan of how unrealistically clean SM can sound, and that kind of sound is very prominent here.


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## Daisser (Jan 2, 2017)

Thanks for the input guys. I made most of the changes Alex suggested on my last pass. I added more reverb for the Brass and pushed it farther back in the mix on the opening part. I will mess with it additionally to see if I can get it a bit wetter throughout on the Brass but I don't want to loose bite on the brass.


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