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Iceland

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Author Comments

Okay, so there are a few things I need to say about this one:


1) This piece was done for one of my university classes on contemporary culture in Iceland (yes, it's an elective). Our first assignment was designated "free-play", as in, you could do just about anything you wanted. Some made paintings or sculptures, a couple of people wrote poems or plays, others baked, etc... Since this is my main hobby I figured it would be dumb not to try my hand at a song. The only rule was that whatever you made had to be related to the book that we had read recently, "The Swan", by GuĂ°bergur Bergsson (Try saying that 10 times... actually, try saying that at all haha). Basically it's about this girl who was born and raised by the sea (hence the waves), and she loves it very much, but then she has to go work on a farm in the countryside (she rides horses during that time, hence the galloping at the end), and along the way she evolves as a person emotionally, blah blah blah... So I tried to capture some of the mysterious nature of the book, as well as the feeling of the "abundant space" that seems to be somewhat of a hallmark of Icelandic geography.


2) This is a rare occasion in which I had to create a song based around a pre-existing idea or feeling, rather than just making whatever I want and then "assigning" a meaning to it afterwards. I found it to be an interesting creative challenge. Another key difference is that all the tracks in this song are live recordings, unedited in note volume, duration, etc... so the tempo flows a little bit, and there is a more natural feel to it, I think.


3) I actually presented this in class, but due to technical/audio equipment limitations, I received an extension on the deadline so that my presentation lined up with a guest speaker we had. This was decided because the guest speaker was actually an Icelandic composer (GuĂ°mundur Steinn Gunnarsson) who was bringing little computer speakers for his lecture on Icelandic music. So, I got to play this song off of his laptop for him, the professor, and about a dozen other people, which was very cool. I received some nice feedback. When I know the grade I got, I'll update this description.


TL;DR -- Uh, Iceland.


EDIT: Got an A!

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Very good. Just added this to my favorites.

Birdinator99 responds:

Thanks man!

Hey, my friend is making a game and he would like to use your music on his game, do you give him permission to use your music on his game? (your music and your name is going to appear on the credits) we would aprecciate very much!

Birdinator99 responds:

He does have my permission to use this song specifically ("Iceland"), as long as the game is not being made for commercial purposes and proper credit is given (as you have suggested). I would also appreciate it if you'd let me know later where this game will be available, so I can check it out too ;)

Cheers!

Fantastic.

I wasn't sure about the waves at first, but I came to like their thickness.

The stringed instrument sounds quite real, is it? My guess is a good synth, given what you have to work with.

You had a great sense of timing throughout this piece, I liked the pauses.

It could be considered a bit simple, in terms of the number of sounds used, but I found it well composed despite that. Also, the quality of each sound is well balanced with the others.

The shakers added well to the atmosphere, and the base provided a nice warm undertone.

The horse galloping at the end didn't sound out of place, so props on that.

The pad (pretty sure it's a pad) reminded me of the voices of the four masked giants from Majora's Mask.

All in all, I think this piece was well thought out and well composed. Good job!

Birdinator99 responds:

Thanks brosef,

I like what I got with the waves. I feel like they sit in the background nicely.

What you're hearing is called "Pad of the Orient", which is actually the guitar and the pad together as one instrument. I think the guitar part sounds very fake haha

I like songs with fewer instruments because it lets you focus in more on each one when listening. They carry more weight, and therefore need to be selected carefully. It's like a different kind of challenge when making the song.

Dude, we gotta play MM...

Cheers!

Credits & Info

Artist

Listens
1,175
Faves:
5
Downloads
30
Score
Waiting for 2 more votes

Uploaded
Feb 3, 2015
5:16 PM EST
File Info
Song
7.2 MB
3 min 10 sec

Licensing Terms

Please contact me if you would like to use this in a project. We can discuss the details.