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What Happens on a Stage's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Overall Uniqeuness | #1 | 4.278 | 4.278 |
| Execution | #3 | 4.333 | 4.333 |
| Listenability | #3 | 4.444 | 4.444 |
| Overall | #3 | 4.167 | 4.167 |
| Composing Quality | #4 | 4.222 | 4.222 |
| Correlation to Theme | #36 | 3.556 | 3.556 |
Ranked from 18 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Description
Duet written for piano and guitar.
Embedded audio is available on the project page for convenience! Project page also has a bunch of extra stuff about the soundtrack! Thanks for listening! Criticism welcome!
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Comments
"Plan" went pretty dark with all the harmonies, got whiplashed when the cheerful rhythm "Setup" and "Flourish" played haha.
I assume you played and recorded everthing yourself. Really love the timbre and dynamics on the guitar! Awesome work!
Haha, thanks!
Yep, mostly done live. The MIDI piano parts are about 80% live, with hearty amounts of post-programming, and a couple sequenced segments here and there. Glad you enjoyed the guitar! Had a lot of fun recording those tracks.
man, this is pretty. kinda reminds me a bit of Lighthouse (2023) by DM Dokuro. tracks 2 and 5 especially sound really atmospheric and almost a little spacey. great work.
Thanks! I'll need to check out Lighthouse.
I love the way you tied all the tracks together! I can almost see the game it would be used in. I think Setup might be my favourite track, just because it's so very peaceful, but I also love the percussion feel in Plan. Kind of makes me think of something tribal. I also like how you restricted yourself in using only piano and guitar. Very nice idea overall and the tracks flow very fluently into the next!
Thanks for your comments! It's been cool to read about which tracks people enjoyed.
Probably the most unique submission I've heard. You used only two instruments but each song felt unique. You did a pretty good job at combining them and I heard a proper flow of tension throughout the tracks, nice work.
Thanks!
Very sweet approach, did not expect anyone to go for a more minimalistic approach, definitely starts experimental but you went more tonal after even in teardown. Leftover is the best so far its very simple but I like the ambiance you went for in general. good job :)
Thank you! I also really like the mood on Leftover.
Great tracks dude!
I'm divided on Teardown and Plan as my favorite.. on one hand I love the intensity and rockyness of Teardown, on the other hand, using the guitar as a drum in the begining of Plan and those really well placed dissonances at the end make it very special!
Compositionwise I just think you could had added a lil counter melody near the end in the piano, but the track still awesome!
Mix is very clear, I didn't feel any of the instruments battling for space and the timbre fits the paitings very well!
Great job, take care :3
Thanks much for the feedback! Glad you enjoyed Plan, was worried that it was a little too experimental, but people seem to enjoy that one!
I think the lack of countermelodies is probably a weak point in some places. Good spot, I can keep stuff like that in mind for future compositions, especially when I'm using a small number of instruments.
Thanks for listening!
Wow that first one was really unique! Really cool how you made those different sounds blend together well for the first track. Overall the blend of the piano and the guitar in the rest of the tracks were great too. Enjoyed listening to something different. Great work!
Thanks!
ooof! Innovative.
Intro sounds like someone hitting the piano/guitar with their hand. are you by chance holding down the strings/fingerings while hitting the guitar? That could be a really cool concept to explore, as a modular artist, i am thinking patch that through a high pass filter to remove some of the low to accentuate the harmonics from the strings reacting/resonating to the percussive hits. This added to fingerings would make for an interesting timbre, with tone/melody/note/chord control. Also would have like to see the rhythm from tapping/knocking the guitar progressively get more complicated, as if it were building into the next section. (what comes to mind as a reference is flamenco rhythms but any rhythms work.)
Flourish and Setup seem a tad interchangeable. Both fit well but i would draw line between the words flourish and the consummation idea. The image associated with consummation seems to reference an the idea of overabundance or having wasteful amount more then what is need. A few steps beyond flourishing. The song absolutely fits the word flourishing and even seems to communicate adversity at some points but not enough to ruin a good day. (hopefully this section makes sense)
"Plan" & "Tear Down" are my personally favorites. "Tear down" reminds me of flamenco guitarist. Personally would have like to see you explore the techniques introduced in "Plan" and "Tear Down". already explained "Plan" so in regards to "Tear Down", the timbre created from the way you aggressive hit the strings giving me the impression that the string is loose. The timbre is a sort of percussive element akin to a snare for the fact that it produce a sort of noise that can be dampened with your hand to function. Love the idea behind it being destruction.
Love the limitation of Guitar and Piano. Would have like to see the piano used in an alternative manner as well, not sure what kind of piano you own but dynamics mixed with the sustain pedal can simulate a really cool swell effect is done correctly. My apologies, if this sounds like i am complaining, not trying to attack you. But these songs were pretty inspiring. Gona try some of these ideas my self.
Anything i didn't mention, had no complaints about, and fit the prompt well. Amazing work!
Thanks so much for the detailed feedback, and especially the critique! I really appreciate it!
On the intro track, the piano and guitar are being played kinda weirdly. On the guitar, I'm not fretting anything, just hitting the guitar in various places. I am using an alternate tuning (DADGCD), so it might sound "chord-y". Also, some spots give you more string ring than others. Probably would have been cool to do some more complicated rhythms! I might come back to some of the ideas I used in that opening track, since there are a lot of other ideas I didn't use or didn't explore more deeply. I'm not sure fretting the strings while hitting the guitar had even occurred to me! What a cool idea!
For the piano on the intro track, I'm "fluttering" the half-blow pedal while holding the sustain pedal. It gives you these chaotic bursts of sound that are really fun! I think I only partially understand mechanically what's happening there... Anyway, I did that for about an hour and spliced together the best parts. I was also going to hit the sides of the piano while holding down some notes, but the string ringing is too quiet to record easily. Maybe I'd need to open the back of the piano and close-mic it or something.
Interesting observation on the "flourish vs. consummation" idea. I hadn't thought about it that way, but you're right, "flourishing" seems to legitimize the context of the third painting in a way the might make the story less nuanced.
I think it's awesome that you heard the "flamenco" undertones in Teardown! I completely agree, in fact, that riff is loosely based on a flamenco riff Robert Trujillo wrote on an acoustic guitar, which later turned into a Metallica song! Probably some more stuff I could have explored on that track as well. Thanks for the insight!
Beautiful. Firstly - as an ex band member - all of this takes me back - its just simply awesome. My best friend and I, he a guitarist and myself a pianist would create music weekly. Genuinely feel emotional listening to this.
Plan - Ooft. Just hearing the acousticness of it all. Just. Bloody. Lovely. Super well recorded. Oh my.
Setup - Lovely - reminds me of the village theme from Terranigma. That reverb.
Flourish - Nice - Feels like something out of a Zora village. Yes.
Teardown - Great drive!
Leftover - Nice call backs. The space is super effective. Nice work on the harmonics too!
What an amazing and unique way to interpret the theme. Music simply masterfully done. Stunning.
Thanks so much for the detailed impressions! And thanks for listening! I had a lot of fun recording this.
This is an incredible entry, such a demonstration of how sparsity can be just as effective as built up compositions. Honestly just love it. I found Flourish the best, I think partially it felt the most melodic, but I deeply appreciated the less melodic tracks. Great take on the theme!
Thank you! I think Flourish might be my favorite as well.
Absolutely love this submission! Just the way it sounds to the smoothness and easy laid back listening it has. Boy, this is my favorite so far! I loved the second and third tracks best. They were really fun. Great work here! And the way you tied everything together and the story behind it, oh it was wonderful. So fun.
Thanks so much for the kind words! I'm thrilled that you had fun listening!
I love on the instruments, it was relaxing and can be serious at time even with 2 instruments, thanks for sharing this unique composition!
Glad you like it!
What a unique take on the theme, worked so well on me !
Very descriptive using only 2 instruments, in such varied ways, really well done !
Sounds are very well balanced, and it's well written, i had a blast listening to it !
I think Setup is my personnal favorite, such a chill and cute vibe. But special mention to Teardown , made me think of Metal music on acoustic instruments, worked wery well
Congrats, it's very unique and interesting !
Thanks so much! Glad you liked it!