Piano and strings

[Megaqwerty]

I just stumbled onto Recording Review today, so I figured I might as well get some advice on what I'm working on at the moment.

Song is unfinished as I still need to add vocals (the annoying woodwind thing is the placeholder for that), record the piano part (in order to make it sound somewhat realistic), and add a piano solo to the outro.

Any criticism or advice would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

[brandondrury]

The intro is kinda long and redundant. I probably have ADD though.

The lack of velocity variation in the piano gets fatiguing in time in the current state of the mix.

I'd want some bass and drums in this thing as it doesn't seem to stand on it's own.

You are off to a good start.

Brandon

[Megaqwerty]

Thanks for the advice!

The intro consists of one phrase played twice, so I'll just chop off the second
phrase and it'll be 12 seconds shorter. At 25 seconds, it is a wee bit long.

Yeah, I really hate the lack of dynamics in the piece, but I won't be able to fix that for a week until I get my keyboard back (since I would rather not adjust the velocities by hand...). In the mean time, I'll work on adding bass and drums.

[adalos]

The piano sound you're using is pretty harsh and midi-sounding. The chords all seem to be aggressively pounded on as well, making a grating contrast between the softness of a string or wind instrument. I think you'd get better results if you use a softer and more realistic piano sample, as well as focusing on varying your dynamics.

[musoatten]

i agree with adalos, the piano is a little agressive sounding, and as 'the boss' said you could include some bass and drums.You may want to try using arpeggio chords during the flute, or whistle, solo parts to break up the flow of the piece, and it does lack dynamics. (what's the annoying woodwind thing?) However, you have the basis for your song, so keep at it and i'm sure you'll get more advice from this forum.