This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License and ©2012 Gregory Weaver.
Before I begin, no, this new tune is not based on the picture to the right. I thought it would be nice to have a graphic on the post, so I did an image search for "fanfare" on Google and, lo and behold, there was the white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland with my initials on his chest (it might be a bib) blowing a trumpet on the top row. What are the odds??
Shortly after I finished up my latest draft of "Gumshoes" I quickly inputed a few new ideas into Logic and Finale. "Fanfare and Jubilee" is one of those. It actually started off solely as a fanfare - I wanted to do a brass quintet-like piece - but something made me veer off into a different territory, namely the jubilee part, which now is the focus of the tune.
Take a listen to my first minute and a quarter or so--it'll give you a good idea of the piece's flavour:
*Note: Please listen to this draft via the embedded audio on the original site of my blog here.
Imagine: A player walks around a city and triggers an FMV of a procession. A king or hero or what have you is announced by the brass at the start of a festival and the crowd is snapped to attention. Following the appearance of the figure, shenanigans ensue--it's a party! Woo! Everyone go have fun!
That's the idea. Then you go and try to assassinate the figure amidst the parading and festivaling or something. Sorry, thems the dregs of some video games; your character just can't stop and have fun playing minigames or anything--what do you think this is, 1996?
Anyway, one can just imagine a bustling city if s/he wants to. The piece is meant to represent a lively place. I think it's pretty clear that I've been influenced quite heavily by the scenes created by Yasunori Mitsuda in Chrono Trigger and by my recent indulgence in Miki Higashino's compositions in Suikoden II. Considering Mitsuda especially, locations such as the Millennial Fair in Chrono Trigger and Termina in Chrono Cross are unforgettable not only because of what the player does in them and because they're spectacular in the most literal sense of the word, but because the music gets engraved in the player due to how perfectly fitting it is and how masterfully it captivates the player. That's what my goal is for this piece (if only I had a place to put it!).
Writing this didn't take very long. If it weren't for some issues I was having with Finale it would have been a pretty smooth ride from start to finish because the ideas flowed (and continue to flow) quite naturally. One issue that you can plainly hear is that the ritardando of the brass is kind of whacked out and is too sluggish. I'm going to work on smoothing that out, but since it wasn't a priority for me I just did a quick fix that makes it sound passable.
Speaking of the brass, I was planning on having an expanded fanfare part, but instead I got so wrapped up in the jubilee that I just went with that (the horns are not gone for good, though--you'll hear them again next draft post). The only thing that will likely be changed in what you hear today is there should be more percussion, i.e., I'll add a tambourine. Unfortunately, adding certain percussion lead to another Finale issue I was having, so I think there will be a minimum amount of percussion overall until I rework the tune in Logic (so don't expect to hear it for quite a while!).
Also, I love bass clarinet. That is all.
I hope you enjoy listening to it! Let me know what you think in the comment section below.
