[Sentimental] Memories (.it)

[cubes]

https://drive.proton.me/urls/ZNSKKCTVY0#J3bwFDQPmS7I

A track that hopefully will evoke nostalgic, sentimental feelings. The first track I've made in OpenMPT that sounds like a real, solid song.

Two tracks in one:
Train on the horizon - It may have an "oriental" sound to it.(it does)
Youth - May be reminiscent of the style of ~2010 pop hits but only in a good way

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Please let me know what you think; I would really appreciate it. I'm especially looking for tips on making songs with more substantial middle (chorus) sections. Most of the songs I've made so far build up a little, enter the chorus, and then quickly fade out.

[Saga Musix]

The various melodies that play at the same time sound like they were written completely independently, without any regard for each other. This results in clashing notes in various places.

Example 1: Right in the first pattern, there are two piano melodies playing completely independently. They use about the same note range. This would be extremely awkward, if not impossible to play on a real piano, and sounds weird. Usually you don't want to have two melodies playing in the same note range, especially if they are played by the same instrument. An exception to that rule of thumb would be two melodies that are always a distance apart (e.g. by a fourth or a fifth).

Example 2: Look at pattern 2, around row 40: You have a bass pad playing a C on channel 7, while there's also a bass piano note on channel 1 playing a D*. Two notes that are just apart by one whole step usually evoke a dissonant feeling. Of course that's not always the case, for example if one of the two notes is shifted up by one or more octaves. But two bass notes so close together is usually calling for trouble (a dissonant feeling).

So, it's not a terrible start, but a lot to improve on. I hope that helps!

* it's an F in the pattern but actually a D. One thing I can recommend is tuning all your melodic instruments to the same root note, most commonly C, so that it's easy to see the relationship between different melodic elements of the song. It also makes it easier to swap out one instrument for another, allowing for easier experimentation.

[cubes]

Thank you for the advice, it will definitely be put to use.
I had no idea about checking the instrument's tuning. Clearly there is still a lot to be learned :-)

Regarding your first point: I was trying to use the second channel as a sort of harmony so that the song wouldn't sound bare, not as a second melody. But I randomly chose whatever notes seemed to fit. Next time I will try to choose notes that belong to a chord formed by using the melody as the root note.

[Saga Musix]

Do check out the tuning fork icon in the sample editor, it's not perfect but can help getting the samples to be tuned to the same base note