Synthesia: Blues Edition

Synthesia is a living project. You can help by sharing your ideas.
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Kasper
Posts: 149

Post by Kasper »

Okay, I've had some fun with the online scoreboard. Much fun.
The only problem is, I don't like the music. And I don't want to spend time in a song I don't like.

I think most people here will have. I don't think synthesia will become a big hit, with those songs.

Problem is of course copyright. But why not go totally blues. Blues is cool, almost everybody want to learn it.
If someone could make a complete blues course for synthesia. Easy medium hard classics all in it. I think that would make synthesia much more popular.

Maybe you can arrange something with this groovewindow guy ?
English was my worst subject on school, so my language could be a bit awkward sometimes...
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

I'm definitely looking for additional sets of high-quality content to add to the game and/or the online scoreboard. I was pretty careful to keep the group names prefaced with "G Major Music" so there would be room for expansion later.

Just like I spent a pretty significant amount of time preening the G Major stuff with a huge amount of help from you guys -- splitting the hands, quantizing it, cleaning up the MIDI events, fixing incorrect notes, etc. -- I would want to make sure each new set was very high quality. If we needed to change a single note later, it would wipe all the scores for that song.
Pianotehead
Posts: 325

Post by Pianotehead »

I have an idea concerning this, Nicholas or others affiliated with Synthesia might want to consider.

After going through this forum one can't help but notice there is a demand among Synthesia users for MIDI files of popular contemporary songs. There are of course some sites offering them, but the price is simply robbery in broad daylight. So why not turn to the MIDI selling parties and say to them:

We the makers of Synthesia have a huge user group which keeps getting bigger, that would like to have MIDI files to play through our program. We can link to your sites if you would put a link advertising Synthesia on your sites.

Maybe you could cut a deal with those MIDI providers, get the price below those 3 to 5 dollars per song (way too expensive.) Or get a package of many songs for a discounted price.

Now I realise if you would want revenues for marketing MIDI sites, that could make it hard to get discounts, but then again the MIDI sellers might want percentages for linking to Synthesia, so revenues of both parties might cancel each other out.

Is this something to think about?
Kasper
Posts: 149

Post by Kasper »

I don't understand why a mp3 cost 1 euro and a midi 3 euro ??
English was my worst subject on school, so my language could be a bit awkward sometimes...
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jimhenry
Posts: 1899

Post by jimhenry »

Kasper wrote:I don't understand why a mp3 cost 1 euro and a midi 3 euro ??
It costs a certain amount to create the master file, an amount that varies tremendously depending on the project. The direct cost of selling a copy of the master file is mostly going to be whatever per copy license fees there might be. A big chunk of the price of a copy is based on trying to make a profit on the cost of producing the master. You can sell a copy inexpensively if you can sell a lot of copies. A copy will be very expensive if you aren't going to be able to sell many copies. Right now the market for legal MIDI files is small, mostly professional musicians who use them as backing tracks when performing a solo artists in low budget shows, like bars, restaurants, and private parties. Thus legal MIDIs are expensive compared to MP3s that are going to outsell the MIDIs by a very large margin. Even at 3 euros for a MIDI file, I'll bet it is not a very profitable business.
Jim Henry
Author of the Miditzer, a free virtual theatre pipe organ
http://www.Miditzer.org/
Kasper
Posts: 149

Post by Kasper »

But how much of that money goes to the artist ?

For many piano songs there is already sheet music available than it won't be so much work right ? Like a couple of hours.
English was my worst subject on school, so my language could be a bit awkward sometimes...
Pianotehead
Posts: 325

Post by Pianotehead »

I would think most of the work is in creating the music - coming up with the melody, arranging and recording it in the studio. Plus marketing work of course. Anybody with basic knowledge of music and computers can poke the song into a notation program and make million copies.

Yes most of the revenues of the sheet music (in whatever form) go to the recording companies, or that's what I've read. Like I said before the sheet books are not that expensive, at least compared to the online MIDIs. Maybe the copyright holders are afraid of MIDI because of the ease of distributing any material in digital form. Didn't illegal copying of music skyrocket after the MP3 revolution?
xchg
Posts: 18

Post by xchg »

Now, talking about G major music, how about St. Louis Blues?

The original W.C. Handy's score from the 1910's is absolutely public domain.
The song can be played slowly (more instant gratification for beginners), it's not terribly hard to play, and it's epic 8-)
And it's also in G.
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jimhenry
Posts: 1899

Post by jimhenry »

xchg wrote:Now, talking about G major music, how about St. Louis Blues?
Great suggestion! Here's a source for the sheet music:
http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/sheetmusic/a/a13/a1311/

A very nice slow performance by John Arpin will be found here:
http://www.trachtman.org/ragtime/JohnArpin.htm
This is highly elaborated so it isn't suitable for beginners. But it does give an idea of how it can sound at a slow tempo. John jumps to faster tempo to finish.

An interesting slow "jazz interpretation" by "Perfessor" Bill Edwards is available here:
http://www.perfessorbill.com/pbmidi13.shtml
Jim Henry
Author of the Miditzer, a free virtual theatre pipe organ
http://www.Miditzer.org/
xchg
Posts: 18

Post by xchg »

Yes, the only thing I can add to that is a link to another great performance by BachScholar:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_94hrye_vW4
xchg
Posts: 18

Post by xchg »

I actually bought the sheet music book called "Library Of Ragtime And Early Blues Piano", so I think I'll seriously make up and play a basic piano version of this song. Well, it's for piano in the first place, that was just my little way of saying "hey, I play piano!" :P

And maybe sing along! "Oh I hate to see the evening sun go down..."
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