#but the symphony orchestra ALREADY performs live movie soundtracks while playing the movie

[an-aura-about-you]

lying on my couch eating chips and wondering when people will give me money for my brilliant idea(the local symphony orchestra should do one of those live movie soundtrack nights with Megamind)

[61below]

Wangxian AU thoughts after attending the symphony

Lan Qiren conductor

LXC principal violinist, LWJ right next to him, the Twin Jades. LWJ plays his mother’s violin

Nie Ningjue, the entire brass section tuba

Meng Yao formerly oboe, but never good enough to play professionally, now in administration (in this happy universe, JGS is in prison for life so MY never does go Full Villain, but he is still a terrifying cutthroat who’s responsible for making his this orchestra world famous, at all costs)

Nie Huaisang, played french horn through school because it was demanded of him, now in Media/Promotions (he is also responsible for the photoshoots where all the conductors are holding their batons as ‘wands’ a la Famous Witches and Wizards and oh boy I will let you just imagine how thrilled LQR was about that)

WWX, flautist BUT he’s also a doctoral student whose ultimate goal is to take over the children’s music program at Cloud Recesses Academy, and he can play any instrument proficiently. Violin? LWJ hates that. Trombone? NMJ hates that. Percussion? Everybody hates that. Just… musical genius squirrel on caffeine WWX. With children.

WWX is also responsible for starting the Live! At the Movies series, where they perform the soundtracks live while the movie plays behind them. LQR really hates that, so so much, but they’re some of orchestra’s most popular performances. (They collaborate with the corresponding professional choir for the 25th anniversary of the release of the LOTR and sell out so many shows that they need to add more)

WWX has a running list of increasingly ridiculous designs for Mahler’s Hammer, up to a Rube Goldberg machine starting from the first box involving sixteen different things including a tennis racket, nerf gun, bowling ball, and a small, indoor-safe firecracker, and he keeps trying to get approval to do them all

LWJ has a wardrobe filled with the standard black but he secretly hates it. He carries lint rollers like most people carry chapstick, bc otherwise he is constantly covered in white rabbit fur.

(So is WWX bc he’s always over, but he never remembers to use the lint roller, so he’s just always covered with rabbit fur anyway)

DRAPY VELVET SHIRTS WITH OSTRICH FEATHERS ON THE SLEEVE CUFFS. SO MANY BLACK SEQUINS. SHEER BLACK PANELS. BLACK SILK CHIFFON SO AIRY IT PRACTICALLY FLOATS WITH THE MOVEMENT OF EACH HAND.

WWX and LWJ constantly swapping concert clothes bc neither of them really know whose is whose any longer. Everyone thinks LWJ is the fashionista of the pair but really they both are. (Srsly, wwx doesn’t get nearly enough credit for being that Dedicated To Style). Also, everyone thinks they’re already married, but they just think they’re still platonic besties, while secretly pining but Respecting Each Others’ Boundaries so hard they think it’s tragically unrequited

MXY has dyed purple hair and wears as many dresses as suits, but he always wears the prettiest heels

Tbh I thought really long and hard about whether LQR would make a good conductor bc they HAVE to be expressive, but then I realized that actually yes it would be perfect, bc ALL the Lans would be like, stone walls normally (LXC better-capable of a friendly façade, but it IS still a brick wall). The ONLY way they express an Emotion(tm) is through music

There’s a crisis when the day before a sold out New Years Eve Gala performance, the famous opera singer who’s supposed to be their headliner can’t make it, so they’re forced to quickly adapt 1/3 of the whole the program. LWJ is tapped to perform his super secret compositions, but the only good thing to come from that is that as the headliner he can set aside the black outfit and get to play his one true instrument: his heirloom Lan clan guqin. He floats onto the stage in clouds of ice blue silk. But the pieces he has been preparing to publish just aren’t quite long enough, there’s still five minutes he’s being asked to fill, so in a desperate, last minute move to save the show, he agrees to play Wangxian. Since he’s never even written the music for that, and since the only other person who’s ever heard it is WWX, so they perform the duet.

They kiss for the first time during the intermission (and oh what a kiss) but they’re both forced to Get Their Shit Together in time to perform the second set. But yeah, after that? After that, they live happily ever after. LWJ becomes a famous composer and eventually takes over conducting from his uncle, WWX teaches children how to love playing music, and they adopt a-Yuan. There’s white rabbit fur on all of their clothes.

[thenovelescapes]

april 2017

This is the first April in five years that I have not been studying for final exams and feverishly reading the textbooks I neglected during the semester. Instead, I’ve been spending my days at work, commuting three hours to/from work, and watching Mad Man with my parents. It’s a wild life, y’all.

- the television -

Speaking of Mad Men, my parents and I wrapped up the series this month with seasons five, six and seven. It’s clearly very well made, and the acting is impressive, but I’m not sure I liked it? My only real opinions about the show are a) Jon Hamm is a fox, and b) Peggy Olson is the best.

In April, I also continued my re-watch of Grey’s Anatomy with seasons three, four, five and six. Predictably, I got sucked back into the Grey’s universe and fell behind on nearly all currently airing shows in favour of binging it. I’ve watched the first five seasons of this show so many times since I first started watching in middle school, and every time I do, I find more and more plots that irritate me. George and Izzie getting together is even worse than I remembered. Izzie having sex with Denny’s ghost? Erica Hahn’s entire presence? Boo, BOOOOOO. In season five, two new characters are introduced - Owen Hunt and Arizona Robbins. Both are characters that I loved (at first) and then grew to absolutely despise in later seasons. (I loved Hunt so much when he was just a great doctor and sweet guy struggling with PTSD, but now I could write an entire dissertation on why he is garbage). But the character development of Meredith Grey and Alex Karev through these first six seasons is so well done and incredibly important to me, and they are the only reason that I am still watching this show thirteen seasons later.

I also spent an intense weekend binge watching 13 Reasons Why this month. The novel, by Jay Asher, was really important to me in high school - I read it a dozen times and did my entire grade 9 English final project on it. I do feel that the adaptation elevated the material, but there were changes made that felt unnecessary and gratuitous and as an adult, I am more aware of how the entire story could be harmful to those struggling with suicide ideation. This piece, by Ijeoma Oluo, does a great job of exploring this. 

- the books -

I fell into a bit of a reading slump this month. I’m still eight books ahead of schedule on my reading challenge (TAKE THAT, GOODREADS) but I only finished three in April. The first was Marlena by Julie Buntin. I preordered this novel back in 2016 and had been anticipating its release for months, so I was extremely excited to dive in. It did not disappoint! But, after I was done, I had trouble sinking into another novel. I started and promptly gave up on four different books before finally settling on Maybe in Another Life by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Reid’s novels are all contemporary romances, and nice, easy reads that you can mainline in an afternoon. I appreciate the existence of these kinds of novels but I have come to the conclusion that I do not like her writing, and this one was particularly bad. Her dialogue is unrealistic and her characters are not at all well-rounded. The main character, Hannah Martin, is obsessed with cinnamon buns and wearing her hair in a high bun, and Reid apparently thought these facts were enough to form a personality because she mentioned them approximately 347 times throughout the book. 0/10 do not recommend.

The last book I read this month was Everything You Want Me to Be by Mindy Mejia. This novel is a murder mystery, told from three perspectives in two timelines - one, before the murder and one after. It started out fairly strong, but I lost interest about halfway through and found myself skim reading the last 100 pages because, while I didn’t care about any of the characters, I wanted to know who the murderer was. It wasn’t a great conclusion - there were three different “twists” in the wrap-up and final one was just a little tooooo convenient.

- the podcasts -

Podcasts, podcasts, podcasts!

My job is extremely dull, so I’ve been keeping myself entertained for eight hours a day with a ton of podcasts. This month, I got into The Hilarious World of Depression, Heavyweight, Someone Knows Something, Nancy and 2 Dope Queens. If you’re looking for true crime, try Someone Knows Something. If you like frank, compassionate conversations about mental health, listen to The Hilarious World of Depression. If you like This American Life-esque human stories, Heavyweight is for you. If you’re looking for a podcast about the LGBTQ+ experience from two queer, people of colour, try Nancy. (Actually, you know what, literally everyone should listen to Nancy - it’s wonderful). If you like to laugh, listen to 2 Dope Queens. (I’ve been muffling laughter at my desk every day listening to Phoebe Robinson, Jessica Williams and their stand-up comic guests. Start with ‘#25 A Jon Hamm Sandwich’, it made me cry-laugh).

If you have any recommendations for me, hit me up here or on Twitter! I’m always looking for new podcasts!

- miscellaneous -

In April, I saw City & Colour live in concert for the fourth time. The shows are always amazing, but this one was truly special - two hours of just Dallas Green with a guitar surrounded by twinkly lights (aka. what I imagine heaven to be).

The Vancouver Symphony Orchestra launched a Harry Potter Film Concert series July 2016 with the Philosopher’s Stone, and this month, they returned with Chamber of Secrets. In this series, the orchestra performs the soundtrack (composed by John Williams) while the film plays on a large screen above the stage. It was an incredibly cool experience. My friend and I went dressed in our house colours (Gryffindor and Ravenclaw, respectively) and the audience was filled with cosplayers and people decked head-to-toe in Hogwarts merch. At the start of the show, the conductor encouraged us to clap and cheer for our favourite moments and characters, to laugh and boo and interact with the material. I’ve already bought tickets for Prisoner of Azkaban, which will run this July.

My parents hold season tickets at a local theatre, so every month they see a different play from the season roster. This month, my dad had a conflict, so I went with my mom to see The Out Vigil, a play written by Julie McIsaac and set in present-day Newfoundland. The cast is made up of only five people - three actors and two musicians - but they have an enormous presence. Act One is rather slow, but Act Two is incredibly compelling and the play features such rich relationships and an interesting magical realism element. Support local theatre!

This month, I also went to see Beauty & the Beast. It is my favourite Disney movie off all time, but the live action version lacked so much of the charm of the animated film. 

I haven’t been listening to much music lately. Music gives my brain too much time to wander, so I’ve been distracting it with podcasts and audiobooks. But, two songs did get stuck in my head this month. Harry Styles’ first solo single, ‘Sign of the Times’, was released on April 7th. It’s all glam rock and falsetto and drama. It’s long, running nearly six minutes, and slow, but I love it because I love him and I cannot wait until his full album is released (May 12th! Pre-order it!). Lorde’s new single ‘Green Light’ is the other song that has been playing in my head on a loop. It is an extremely good song to listen to while stuck in traffic on a sunny day with your windows and sunroof open.

[thetapelessworld]

Spitfire Audio Releases SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA (SSO)

Spitfire Audio Releases SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA (SSO)

Spitfire Audio, purveyors of the finest virtual instruments from the finest musical samples in the world, is proud to announce availability of SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA (SSO) — sampling everything needed to create blockbuster symphonic works for film, games, radio, and television via the finest signal path at Lyndhurst Hall within London’s legendary AIR Studios, served up as an appetising all-in-one, comprehensive core-level professional product for Native Instruments’ industry-standard KONTAKT PLAYER platform — as of January 13...

SSO is an epic saga of orchestral instrument recordings unified under the same (sublime-sounding) roof of Lyndhurst Hall — Britain’s premier scoring facility, attracting some of the world’s biggest movies scores, as well as maintaining its popularity with major classical labels and high-profile recording artists — within London’s legendary AIR Studios by an award-winning team of engineers and composers collectively committed to accomplishing a simple, singular vision: creating supreme soundtracks demands duly going to where the greatest and most successful composers go, using the same instruments and talent, together with the same recording techniques and production principals. Put it this way: it doesn’t get better than Lyndhurst Hall’s 300m2 hexagonal live area with two spacious isolation booths, motorised acoustic canopy, three raised galleries, and a Steinway Model D concert grand piano, while its 50m2 control room boasts one of the world’s largest Neve 88R consoles with 96 channels and Encore automation, SP2 film matrix, and 48 ‘AIR Montserrat’ remote mic amps. All you need is... AIR Studios, to ‘partly paraphrase’ dearly departed studio founder George Martin, the extraordinary English record producer, arranger, composer, conductor, audio engineer, and musician (often referred to as the ‘Fifth Beatle’ by none other than Paul McCartney). Alternatively (and appropriately), AIR Studios is the answer, and Spitfire Audio knows that for sure!

Surely SSO encompasses the very core concept of Spitfire Audio, then? 10 years in design, five years in the making, it ushers in a new chapter in the company’s history — the pinnacle of Spitfire Audio’s achievements over the last decade, to put it bluntly. But even after 50-plus award-winning sample-based orchestral virtual instruments, it’s also an evolution of technique, a codification of the company’s craft. Closely working with A-list composers on AAA productions (with big-budget development and marketing), and as composers working at the coalface themselves, SSO is a culmination of Spitfire Audio’s authentic experience... encyclopaedic in its learning, Death Star-like in its execution of orchestral packages to die for!

That said, SSO didn’t come quickly. Quite the opposite, in fact. For it effectively started out as Spitfire Audio’s long-running BML (British Modular Library) — an ambitious project to create the greatest-sounding and, ultimately, future-proofed living orchestral virtual instruments collection — released in various volumes throughout the last four years. Yet the key objective there was always interconnectivity, with each BML volume locking in with another with the greatest of (musical) ease. Enter ultra-detailed level of samples, articulations, dynamic layers, and round robins gathered from under the architecturally and acoustically stunning structure of one of the largest recording rooms in the world at AIR Studios; Spitfire Audio also placed each player in-situ, meticulously mixing four years’ worth of recordings so that each and every component of the band is correctly positioned in the sonic field. Furthermore, making that work calls for a whole lot more than simply panning left and right; to make someone sound like they’re behind the violas and not sitting on their laps involves actually placing them there! Thereafter, Spitfire Audio applied techniques accumulated during brass recording to its woodwind sessions; lessons learned therein had the company returning to Lyndhurst Hall to update some of its string recordings. But by unifying this enormous project undertaking into a single collection, it has pooled the acres of knowledge earned into a single experience... enter SSO!

So SSO represents an outstanding orchestral concept like no other — a longterm project rationalised from its modular form into a new singular one, readying it for future sampling endeavours. Even though SSO embraces every possible classic nuance, Spitfire Audio — as working composers themselves — also comprehensively curated playing styles that are very much part of the zeitgeist... something the company collectively looks forward to writing with itself in future. Fortunately for both battle-hardened veterans like Spitfire Audio and any other discerning composers at the start of their respective careers looking to invest in their future, SSO is designed as a single, pro-level orchestral solution to making blockbusting symphonic music — British or otherwise — by featuring all three major (strings, brass, and woodwinds) families of the orchestra.

It includes SPITFIRE SYMPHONIC STRINGS, summing up the foundation of Spitfire Audio’s approach as quite literally the ultimate encyclopaedic compendium of symphonic strings sampling, with blockbuster content originally recorded with no expense spared via the finest signal path at Lyndhurst Hall, playing host to the same 60 star string players performing on the same instruments featured on so many memorable scores recorded there for films that have grossed billions between them; SPITFIRE SYMPHONIC BRASS, a definitive compendium of orchestral brass in different section sizes, ranging from solo to larger groups of the usual suspects alongside cimbassi and contrabass curios, captured to tape for posterity via the finest signal path at Lyndhurst Hall, playing host to the best (British) brass instrumentalists in the world while laying the foundations for the finest orchestral brass library available; and SPITFIRE SYMPHONIC WOODWINDS, with a decade of woodwind virtual instrument-making experience going into creating this second-to-none conclusive compendium for Native Instruments’ industry-standard KONTAKT PLAYER platform, featuring the finest woodwind performers recorded and ‘deep sampled’ with no expense spared via the finest signal path at Lyndhurst Hall.

However, that’s not all... SPITFIRE MASSE meticulously delivers a mega-epic, instant orchestra created from re-orchestrating the best of SSO. As an exclusive toolset only available to owners of SSO, this is designed for pros working to their limit, feeling the need for speed to get them to the deadline on time. Arranged and orchestrated by Spitfire Audio’s award-winning compositional team, these no-nonsense single patches for two-handed use with multiple and transformative dynamics controlled via CC#1 (modulation wheel) pay particular studious attention to their responsiveness and playability — perfect for getting the job done. Make those (musical) mission impossibles possible... with a little help from your friends at Spitfire Audio and SSO!

SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA can be purchased and digitally downloaded (as 385.9 GB of uncompressed .WAV files, featuring 273,758 samples) from Spitfire Audio for £1,499.00 GBP (inc. VAT)/$1,699.00 USD/€1,739.00 EUR (inc. VAT) from here: https://www.spitfireaudio.com/shop/a-z/spitfire-symphony-orchestra/ (Owners of any SSO libraries — SPITFIRE SYMPHONIC BRASS, SPITFIRE SYMPHONIC STRINGS, and/or SPITFIRE SYMPHONIC WOODWINDS — will see the price paid automatically reduce to account for those already purchased products when adding SSO to the cart.)

Note that Native Instruments’ free KONTAKT PLAYER is included with SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, while Spitfire Audio’s free Download Manager application for Mac or PC allows anyone to buy now and download anytime.

For more in-depth information, including several superb-sounding audio demos, please visit the dedicated SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA webpage here: https://www.spitfireaudio.com/shop/a-z/spitfire-symphony-orchestra/

Watch Spitfire Audio co-founder and Director Paul Thomson’s overview of SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA here:    

Watch Spitfire Audio co-founder and Director Paul Thomson’s ‘traditional’ SPITFIRE MASSE video walkthrough  

Watch Spitfire Audio’s powerful promo video for SPITFIRE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA    

Also we at Tapelessworld plan on a series of walkthrough videos using SSO in Mutiple Daws using Vienna Enseble Pro 6   and Midi Kinetics Composer Tools Pro