# Eternity Rising **Epic/Film piece featuring Hollywood Brass ;)



## Sam Dillard (Jan 6, 2012)

Heya everyone ^_^

It's been a long time since I've composed an original piece, over two years in fact. So for Christmas I treated myself to some more RAM and Hollywood Brass to kick-start some new music making.

This is actually an older piece I dug up, started circa 2009 or so, and decided to finish it with better instruments. It's kind of a dramatic piece, with the concept being about the journey from micro to macro, life to death, and stuffs like dat hehe.

Anywho, rambling aside, I spent about two days editing a music video for it, mainly as an excuse to show neat underwater and space footage because I like that kind of stuff hehe, but also to help set the visual tone for the piece.

Please watch in HD for best experience :)
*http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5-YrwTR3zY&list=UUVp9mxsL4ALPxBHqMh2UUzg&hd=1*

Also up on SoundCloud
*http://soundcloud.com/samostudios/eternity-rising*


This was a tough piece to finish and get sounding the way I wanted, but it was good to get back into composing new stuff. Any comments appreciated, thanks for listening 

-Sam


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## David Story (Jan 6, 2012)

Great piece, really polished. What's the piano? The brass is as good as I've ever heard with samples. It does have an "epic" sweep overall.


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## RiffWraith (Jan 6, 2012)

Very nice!

I agree about the brass. The horns at 1:25 - was that all a legato patch, or did you mix in some marcatos?

The piano sounds like Ivory to me.

My only critisizm would be the cellos at 1:05. They seem a bit flat, and need some more dynamics.

Otherwise, very good!

Cheers.


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## Lex (Jan 7, 2012)

Like it a lot...actually it's been a long time since I have put anything from VI-C on my playlist...this I intend to listen to many times in the future. Cheers


alex


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## Resoded (Jan 7, 2012)

Sounds great, very nice combination with the footage.


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## JoKern (Jan 7, 2012)

Really cool. 

Your music would easily match a real nature documentation film. Although the footage here is also beautiful. Good work.


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## Alex Temple (Jan 7, 2012)

Nice work! I really like the way it builds - none of the changes sound forced at all. I do love that majestic brass melody beginning at 4:21.


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## adg21 (Jan 7, 2012)

great stuff, did you do this with gold or diamond?


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## Dracarys (Jan 7, 2012)

adg21 @ Sat Jan 07 said:


> great stuff, did you do this with gold or diamond?



This. 
Im debating between HW brass gold and cinebrass. Only thing is hw stings which i assume is set up the same way lacks the thearticularions i need. 

Anyways this sounds great, brass is excellent.


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## Dracarys (Jan 7, 2012)

adg21 @ Sat Jan 07 said:


> great stuff, did you do this with gold or diamond?



This. 
Im debating between HW brass gold and cinebrass. Only thing is hw stings which i assume is set up the same way lacks the thearticularions i need. 

Anyways this sounds great, brass is excellent.


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## choc0thrax (Jan 7, 2012)

Very nice!

I firmly believe George Fenton's score for Deep Blue is one of the best scores of the last decade so I like this kinda stuff.


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## hbuus (Jan 7, 2012)

Holy cow, this is superbly created - music and video seen as a whole.
I, too, share your fascination with this wonderful planet of ours and its inhabitants.
The only thing I felt was missing, was at the very end where I felt a zoom-out from Planet Earth to our entire solar system would have been appropriate.
To show that yes, man have come a long way, but there is still so much left for us to explore.
We really are just the tiniest of tiny little pale blue dot in the Universe.

Best,
Henrik


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## Sam Dillard (Jan 8, 2012)

David Story @ Fri Jan 06 said:


> Great piece, really polished. What's the piano? The brass is as good as I've ever heard with samples. It does have an "epic" sweep overall.



Thank you, yeah Hollywood Brass didn't turn out to be the "end all, be all" of brass libraries I hoped for, but it adds a nice punch when blended properly with other samples. Piano is actually the default piano module that comes with Sonar 

-Sam


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## Ed (Jan 8, 2012)

This sounds really really good!.

How easy is it to get Hollywood Brass to play that?


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## PMortise (Jan 8, 2012)

Great stuff! I really liked the visuals as well...I'm a docu-junkie. :mrgreen:


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## tls (Jan 9, 2012)

Nice!

I do think the strings sound kinda dry and without an "organic vibe". What library are you using for those? The brass sounds very good though!


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## Sam Dillard (Jan 9, 2012)

adg21 @ Sat Jan 07 said:


> great stuff, did you do this with gold or diamond?



Thanks, this is HB Gold, I am too poor to afford diamond >_< And really the only difference (as far as I know) is mic settings, which I can do without.

-Sam


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## bwherry (Jan 9, 2012)

Great stuff, Sam! I liked "Cali And Turtle" a lot, too.


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## utopia (Jan 10, 2012)

Sam Dillard @ Mon Jan 09 said:


> adg21 @ Sat Jan 07 said:
> 
> 
> > great stuff, did you do this with gold or diamond?
> ...


Thanks for clearing that out. Could you also say which strings were used? HS gold?


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## Sam Dillard (Jan 10, 2012)

utopia @ Tue Jan 10 said:


> Sam Dillard @ Mon Jan 09 said:
> 
> 
> > adg21 @ Sat Jan 07 said:
> ...



Lass Lite, EWQLSO Gold, and Garritan for the main strings, HS was out of my budget range unfortunately.

-Sam


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## dannthr (Jan 10, 2012)

Always a pleasure, Sam.


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## Reegs (Jan 10, 2012)

Hi Sam,

Sounds great! Wonderful ensemble sound and great development in this thing.

The video is stunning too.

And the brass, holy cow!

No one has said much about the mix job yet, so let me be the first to congratulate you on achieving wonderful clarity.


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## dcoscina (Jan 10, 2012)

the brass string unison to my ears is exceptionally realistic. Nice phrasing- you really captured a real orchestra sound in that passage. 

The piece in its entirety has a nice flow and contrast to it. Nice job. If this is mostly EW they would do well to use it to show case their libraries. It's a pretty convincing demo. Makes me want to buy HB Gold!


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## Sam Dillard (Jan 11, 2012)

JoKern @ Sat Jan 07 said:


> Really cool.
> 
> Your music would easily match a real nature documentation film. Although the footage here is also beautiful. Good work.



Thank you, a nature documentary is actually not what I had in mind when I originally composed this, but I couldn't really tell the story I wanted to tell, I didn't want to have just a still image background so I figured I would add some video. And I dig scenes of nature so in the end, that's the theme that I went with for the visuals, I'm glad you enjoyed it 

-Sam


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## Sam Dillard (Jan 11, 2012)

hbuus @ Sat Jan 07 said:


> Holy cow, this is superbly created - music and video seen as a whole.
> I, too, share your fascination with this wonderful planet of ours and its inhabitants.
> The only thing I felt was missing, was at the very end where I felt a zoom-out from Planet Earth to our entire solar system would have been appropriate.
> To show that yes, man have come a long way, but there is still so much left for us to explore.
> ...



Thank you, to be honest though, my original vision was actually meant to be the story of a human being.

If I were able to direct my own film for this, it would start with a child being born. We would follow the child's journey of life, as he gazed up at the stars with unquenchable fascination and longing to be part of the vast heavens above. The child grows into an explorer, who spends his life trying to climb higher and higher, to the summit of an impossibly high mountain.

The mid-point of the song, where the tone gets a bit more solemn, represents kind of the 'point of no return' for the explorer. Weak and dying from the elements he continues on, and the climax of the song is when he finally reaches the summit. And then with his last few breaths, we would continue to ascend, until his silhouette merged with that of the curving Earth falling out of view, and we were now part of the greater universe.

That's the idea behind the piece, and why it's called "Eternity Rising" but telling a story like that is difficult when trying to piece together various video clips, so I just went with a nice nature theme, and tried to keep the feeling of rising or ascending, from the microscopic world to the entire planet. 

I probably put too much thought into it though, as it was just a song I wanted to finish and give Hollywood Brass a first test-run, hehe.

-Sam


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## marcotronic (Jan 12, 2012)

Wow!!! I'm speechless... This is soooo beautiful!

Awesome composition and production and the video you cut fits perfectly.

Congrats!!!

Marco


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## Sam Dillard (Jan 12, 2012)

Thanks I'm happy you enjoyed it :D

-Sam


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## germancomponist (Jan 12, 2012)

Wow!

This is a very fine score! The composition, the arrangement and the sound, absolutely great!

In the last days I have listend to some very good music here on VI, but this score is outstanding!

HB = excellent!

Thanks for sharing!


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## jleckie (Jan 12, 2012)

Absolutely beautiful dude. Thank you for sharing dis.


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## Sam Dillard (Jan 14, 2012)

Thanks  Yeah HB is nice indeed.

-Sam


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