# It's just a string quartet, but...



## Dear Villain (Dec 3, 2018)

I'm hoping you'll listen and enjoy, even if it's not epic 

VSL Solo Strings, Mir Pro.



Ciao for now,

Dave


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## Kony (Dec 3, 2018)

I enjoyed this very much - thanks for sharing


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## Dear Villain (Dec 3, 2018)

Kony said:


> I enjoyed this very much - thanks for sharing



Thanks, Kony! Really appreciate your taking the time to listen and comment...Thanks also to Rob and SimonCharlesHanna


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## Eliot (Dec 3, 2018)

Cool interplay and development of contrasting themes.


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## Dear Villain (Dec 4, 2018)

Eliot said:


> Cool interplay and development of contrasting themes.



Thanks for listening and commenting, Eliot! This movement is actually an amalgam of the thematic material from the first 3 movements and I originally only planned on it being in 3 movements, before adding this one to bring it all together.


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## Ned Bouhalassa (Dec 4, 2018)

Really good work. A number of gestures sound very fake, but the writing is solid, playful and shows range and imagination, so... who cares?!

And I think that often, a string quartet is much harder to write than an epic cue. Bravo.


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## brenneisen (Dec 4, 2018)

Ned Bouhalassa said:


> who cares?!



the client


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## Dear Villain (Dec 4, 2018)

Thanks, Ned. Glad you enjoyed it. Always open to hearing specifically where you think it sounds "very fake" as I do strive for as real a performance as possible and want to improve.

Brenneisen, I know your comment was directed at Ned, but let me clarify that in this instance, there is no client. My concert pieces are commissions for live performance, and the ensembles that play my music are only interested in mock ups to give them something to listen to while they look at the score. String quartet music pushes the limits of virtual instruments and while they're getting closer, there's still no substitute for the gritty realism of a live ensemble.

Cheers!
Dave


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## TheSigillite (Dec 4, 2018)

Great piece. How did you get the instruments to harmonize so well it sounded like they said dearvillainmusic.com?


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## Dear Villain (Dec 5, 2018)

TheSigillite said:


> Great piece. How did you get the instruments to harmonize so well it sounded like they said dearvillainmusic.com?



You know, dearvillainmusic.com is my signature cadence...if you think the strings say it well, you should hear how great the winds do it in my latest woodwind quintet


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## Ned Bouhalassa (Dec 5, 2018)

Dave, what stood out for me were the 16ths runs, these lacked realism.


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## Nathan Einhorn (Dec 5, 2018)

I quite like the piece, even if I find it a bit ... well behaved  Then again, I didn't hear the other movements, but I missed a bit of double strings, pizzicati and stuff like that here and there. But I find it well written, well built.

Gotta say I'm not a big fan of the sound of the mock up. It sounds a bit like it's played behind a curtain, you can't really hear details, I think that's coming from your Mir settings. Maybe you'd be better off with a more dry sound, and more precise. Otherwise, I agree with Ned, some gestures are not sounding great, but there is so much virtual instruments can do. I'd be curious to see the score to check how the mock up is translating all that.


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## Dear Villain (Dec 5, 2018)

Interesting to hear a different perspective on the sound. It's so personal, isn't it? I believe often we are used to really close-up mics, so with this, I incorporated more room sound as many of my favourite string quartet recordings do, while still trying to keep the detail/clarity. As for it being well behaved, what can I say? I'm a good boy and write like that 

Dave


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## wst3 (Dec 5, 2018)

I think the writing is brilliant - there was one spot, right around the minute mark, where it seemed to lose cohesion, but then it was back.

I would agree with Ned about some of the really fast runs - they sound like really fast runs made with a library, but runs in general, and fast runs in particular, seem to be one of the more difficult things to "make real".

As far as the overall sound, I liked it a LOT on my laptop speakers, on my studio monitors I felt like maybe I was missing some detail, but that was not a bad thing, just a choice. Meaning I still liked it a lot.


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## Dear Villain (Dec 5, 2018)

Hi Bill,

Gosh, thanks for such a kind comment re. the writing! Yes, there are sample limitations, regardless of libraries/skills, and with VSL, the very precise tuning/playing of the musicians makes it almost "too good to be true" leading to the almost "fake" sound. I always appreciate when I get live performances of my music for that missing element, although more often than not, time/financial constraints lead to under-rehearsed performances and technical issues that at least we don't have to deal with when using samples.

As for production values, my wife, Becky and I work together creating the virtual performances, and we like to say that we're musicians learning production, not the other way around. I have very cheap entry-level monitors in an untreated studio, so sometimes what we hear through our system doesn't translate to other environments. Glad to hear that it still was pleasant through your (no doubt) better studio environment than ours 

Cheers!
Dave


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## JPQ (Dec 12, 2018)

Nice. and i say movie and all music can be epic or not.we need all kind music to my ears bit synthy somehow but much better what expected. and sounds dramatic.


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## ag75 (Dec 12, 2018)

Dear Villain said:


> Interesting to hear a different perspective on the sound. It's so personal, isn't it? I believe often we are used to really close-up mics, so with this, I incorporated more room sound as many of my favourite string quartet recordings do, while still trying to keep the detail/clarity. As for it being well behaved, what can I say? I'm a good boy and write like that
> 
> Dave


I really enjoyed this as well! Speaking of your favorite recordings, you should AB this again one of your favorite recordings to try to capture some of tone. There is also a great plugin called Magic AB that does this well. I tend to agree that it feels like to sitting a tad too far back. But I’m also listening on my iPhone! I would love to hear a live recording when the live musicians perform it!


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## Dear Villain (Dec 12, 2018)

JPQ said:


> Nice. and i say movie and all music can be epic or not.we need all kind music to my ears bit synthy somehow but much better what expected. and sounds dramatic.



Thank you. I confess to being a bit sarcastic with the title...I'm actually personally far more impressed by string quartet music (written by the masters) than virtually any "epic" music today. That said, I'm aware that the taste of most not brought up with classical music is going skew towards the film/epic stuff which is why I issued the warning 

Cheers,
Dave


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## Dear Villain (Dec 12, 2018)

ag75 said:


> I really enjoyed this as well! Speaking of your favorite recordings, you should AB this again one of your favorite recordings to try to capture some of tone. There is also a great plugin called Magic AB that does this well. I tend to agree that it feels like to sitting a tad too far back. But I’m also listening on my iPhone! I would love to hear a live recording when the live musicians perform it!



Thanks again! I've matched recording eq's in the past, but will definitely check out Magic AB. Usually, live performances of my music aren't recorded in a controlled, studio-like way, making them underwhelming compared to virtual renditions. If ever I could get a well-rehearsed, studio/location recording with a top notch ensemble, then we'd blow the samples out of the water.

All the best,
Dave


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## JPQ (Dec 13, 2018)

Dear Villain said:


> Thank you. I confess to being a bit sarcastic with the title...I'm actually personally far more impressed by string quartet music (written by the masters) than virtually any "epic" music today. That said, I'm aware that the taste of most not brought up with classical music is going skew towards the film/epic stuff which is why I issued the warning
> 
> Cheers,
> Dave



I like also smaller things. i generally feel i dont evenmainly want do massive things ut still have optionall what my imagintion want.


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## Paul T McGraw (Dec 19, 2018)

I think the mix is good. You can find lots of quartet recordings with a similar soundscape. Here is one that is not exactly the same, but it is close.


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## Dear Villain (Dec 20, 2018)

Thanks, Paul! Enjoyed listening to the Schubert. There's still an energy and magic to live performance that we'll never quite get with samples.

Cheers!
Dave


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