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But yes, it’s time I did something like this really.

The initial idea was to make a few CDs with my contempary concert hall music  and send them off to radio stations, in case they would be interested in getting them on air. But after talking with lovely auriond! I also got a lot of back up from other people, who are always very supportive, coming mostly from CGEmpire.

However, being the perfection freak that I am, I had to do everything myself to make sure that it’s exactly like a want it!

So here is a small break down:

• I obviously need printed CDs, covers and back covers and Jewel cases. For any amount over 100 the obvious choice is to go to some CD replication/duplication company. But for such a small amount prices, in the UK, are sky high at around £1.50!
• I also need an artist, or graphic designer to make the cover sleeve for the CD. Luckily my friend Petter (Andail), from AGS, came to the rescue and agreed to do it for free. But certainly if I sell any considerable amount, I have already told him that I will pay him! By no means I would want anyone working for free for me, while I make even $1!
• Shipping. It’s not a predetermined cost and I could have customers pay for shipping but it somehow seems weird. In addition it will add up to the price; and the price in self publishing is everything. I certainly cannot match the quality of professional and commercial published CDs.
• The artists! Thus far I have a somewhat limited amount of quality recordings. So I found a great pianist, called Avguste Antonov who has agreed to do a recording of a fabulous 9 minute piece of mine. Of course he will be paid and so will the recording studio. Luckily all other artists have agreed and there are no other complications.

While the initial idea was to go as cheap and as good as possible, by now I have realised that if I want quality I will have to go quantity to simply cover my expenses. I’m really starting to understand the companies…

I mean 500 CDs will cost £1.5 (or hopefully less), for a full printed and ready to be sold CD. Avguste is also adding to the budget (of course I can’t name the exact price) and so is Petter. This would mean that with everything included every CD from the 500 costs me around £3 each! £3×500=£1500 in total. If I sell the CDs for £7/10 euros/$15 then I do  need to sell at least 200 CDs to make up the initial costs.

If I didn’t have a family I would be completely romantic, but now I do have to think about what’s happening and what will happen.

Being a composer is one thing. Being a composer for a computer game sometimes also means being the sound designer, which in turn means… sound effects (sfx for short).

So far things have been simple in Resonance in terms of implimentation. Some music here, a few (let’s say a dozen) sfx there. ok.

But with this new room/scene, where things are really scary, we have been discussing forever really and only very recently (read over the weekend) we decided on the general plan: mainly NO music. Which is a pain in the arse let me tell you. No music means that sfx are out in the open! It means that you need lots more. Thus far I’ve completed more than 20 and I’ve still not touched several ‘categories’! Imagine that!

But this is turning to be a great scene! Really scary! So scary that it got my younger son scared. “Not again!” and he started crying. I wish I had a camera somewhere to prove that it is true, as nobody will believe me in the end.

We have, both me and Vince XII, realised that it is important to balance silence with music, sfx, with total silence and go for the optimal solution in every scene. And it is a pleasure working like that.

In addition to sfx, there are certain key moments in the specific scene, where music starts and is timed, as much as it can be. Which certainly creates a few problems, no? Not every computer is the same and no computer will enjoy playing 6-7 ogg files at the same time! Playing these magnificent format has one fault; it takes plenty of CPU power to playback (thus decompress on the fly) an ogg file, more than an mp3 file and much more than a wav file. If the game ends up being distributed via CD/DVD, then no problem. But if it is downloadable then there might be a few problems.

Further to playback the graphics and animation also takes up CPU power.

This certainly does not mean that the game won’t play on slower computers, but just that it will be… slower. Which is disasterous for any attempt to sync music events!

Take this simple example: A chassing scene. The hero is being chassed by vilains and everything leads to a big jump of a balcony, in a movie. The most logical thing is to start a “chase tune” which grows in volume and end it in a big bang, right before the jump. Well if this would happen in a game, it should be timed to the second in order to work. Imagine running, being chasses and jumping and the music having not yet reached the climax.

There is a way out however, by using different layers of music (this is why so many ogg files might end up being played together) which are timed backwards from the end.

I can’t say anything more without betraying the whole game, but trust me this is turning out to be a great experience for me and great pleasure to work on. This must mean something, right?

‘The City Under Different Eyes’. Catchy tittle huh?

This is a work for solo piano, with a peculiarity. While everyone I know, would have trouble placing the music outside the very general genre of concert hall music, I have my reason for precluding it.

I’ll keep the theoritical background for myself, until the right time comes, but I’ll just mention the mechanics and the difficulties that come with such an idea.

First of all, while the purpose of the track is to be heard from start to finish, as with almost every piece of music in existance, a single mp3, or wav file, or a CD player, won’t suffice, since the idea is based on the use of specific software, which is to be created along with the music.

Another major difference with any other recording you’ve heard is that every playback will be different. Pretty much like a live concert, where no two performances are the same.

Different aspect is that, not only the playback will be different, but also the place which the recording took place will change from playback to playback.

While these sound very interesting, indeed and it may very well be that some of you have an idea on what I’m after, it is still a rather difficult project to complet and needless to say, it cannot be completed without the outside help of many people.

Initially the software needs to be writen. Yes, I have a very exact idea on what I want the software to do and I even have plenty of ideas on how this can be done, but I lack the technical knowledge of coding. So I do need a coder. In all honesty, through my career in computer games I already know plenty of coders who would be willing to help, as long as the project doesn’t turn into a monsterous feat.

Then I do need as many performers as possible. If you are wondering with the term ‘performers’ I’m including digital performers, who would like to work on the music, responsobily musically, through their DAWs, or studios. Either way, I care about the ending result, which is the performance and not the process which each performer went through.

Of course I will do my best to update all details here.

Poof.

I’ve been working on XII games computer game ‘resonance’ and I have to say that I’m enjoying myself immensly! You see me and Vince XII have worked before and trust each other as well as respect each other.

Either way, for the past few days I’ve been trying to work out Ed’s theme. I won’t go into details about Ed the character, but his music is a complicated issue. It involves a rigid personality development and, needless to say, music must follow, no?

So I’m working in 3 different versions for mr. Ed. But this is not why I’m SO excited about this. Nor is the fact that it’s pretty much the first piece of music that comes rather close to jazz revenues, no.

You don’t believe me? Here have a listen at a preliminary mix of the unfinished track:
Ed’s preliminary mix

Well… None of the above are more exciting than the fact that I will actually collaborate online with 2 of my Internet friends, Iain Brandram-Adams and Robin Jessome for them to add solo lines (to be shamelessly edited by myself later on in audio). I know for certain that these two great musicians (and composer by the way) will add greatly to the mood of the tune and is exactly what is needed here I think.

So a big thanks to Iain and Robin, as well as Vince for being so open minded and always excited to what I want to do.

You may know that I’m doing a PhD in composition. I have to admit that I consider myself lucky. Circumstances have been more than pleasant and fortunate for me.

This is pretty much 12 years of my life in a blog post. Hope you’ll enjoy and maybe get a few ideas yourselves as well.

By the age of 18, I was studying to enter the university, like everyone does in Greece; to study Math, or physics, or IT science maybe, NOT music. I failed completely! I flanked in 3/4 subjects, rather miserably I have to admit. Still I decided to give it another try for next year, having confidence that I’ll do better.

I’ve been having piano lessons since the age of 5, or possibly 6, but I never did progress much. I was playing various stuff and I was composing and everything and I was also playing with a bit of midi, and one of the first sound cards to be out in the market, the Adlib. But academically and in lessons I never went past grade 3 in piano. Although I was playing much more advanced pieces at home.

Either way, when I turned 18 and failed to enter the university, I decided to try piano again, and make sure I do something right in my life! And thus I found an excellent piano teacher, with whom I’m still in touch, and tried to enter a grade. After a few months of preparation the exams came, and I managed to enter grade 6.

I was excited! I started all kinds of theoretical lessons, harmony, orchestration, history of music, etc. In a few months, I knew that I wanted to be a composer, that I didn’t care one bit for entering the university and studying Math or Science, or whatever and that Greece didn’t feel enough for me!

I did mange to enter the university of Ioannina to study Physics, but I don’t think I really passed any classes, apart from computer and English!

Years passed, I was preparing for a diploma in piano, while working in a night bar, playing keyboard (really hard job, which if you keep it up destroys your life) and trying to find information on how to leave the country and study further in music.

I had heard of the State Scholarship Foundation of Greece but I always knew that it was damn hard to get a scholarship and that you actually needed to know somebody from the inside. So I waited until I would meet the right person. There was time yet, although I was well over 20 by then.

Got my diploma in piano, my degree in harmony, starter studying counterpoint, got that diploma as well and at some point I decided that it would be a good idea to check out the exams for those scholarships. To see how hard they were and the whole situation.

June 2002, I went into the classroom and gave the exams with other 5 people! Pretty good chances to begin with! 1/5, or 20%! Additionally from what I could see, 2 out of 5 failed straight away, being late, or writing half score in pencil, half in pen (which shouldn’t be this way, since it was considered a sign to bypass the anonymity of the exams), and other reasons. So the numbers were 1/3, which are more than great!

Still I didn’t think I would ever win. So I didn’t care at all! In the language exams, I simply didn’t show up at all! At that point, I wanted to study in Paris, in the Conservatoire national supérieur de musique et de danse de Paris. Very tough to enter there, let me tell you!

Either way, in September, I decided to check on the scholarship exam results. To my amazement, the foundation decided to hand out 2 scholarships instead of one and since I was second in line, I got the scholarship! YAY me!

Now, here is where the really lucky bits begin.

I failed entering the conservatoire in Paris, so I didn’t have anywhere to go. Being kind and really cute (!) I asked them if I could hold on to the scholarship and use it next year. The reply was affirmative. So I got 1 year extension. Pretty sweet, huh?

Only that next year at that time, I was in the army in Greece. So I ask them, quite nicely, once again, if I could get a second extension. And they say yes again.

By that time I knew that it would be impossible to enter the conservatoire in Paris, so I just decided to turn my mind in the UK. Additionally, I had failed the language test in the scholarship foundation, so the scholarship was only for Nations where they spoke English.

And I manage to enter for a Masters in Music in Royal Holloway, University of London. At last my dream had come true! I was going to study abroad. I was going to concentrate in composition. With one catch.

By that time (2004) I was already married with 1 small boy.

So we just moved all together in the UK, in Old Windsor, a small village next to the university and I started studying and getting the scholarship, and my wife was working (she’s an architect).

I think it’s time to share a few details for the scholarship. I think that it’s one of the most amazing scholarships around. I’ve not seen a better one really. At least not for Greeks, and not in the universities around here. It included the tuition fees (which are around £3000 per year), and a monthly stipend of £580. For 3 years! For 3 bloody years! Do the math and see how much this gives you. Around £30000! To study!

But, but, but, things are not always fun.

2004-2005 scholarship! Check!

2005-2006 (Started a PhD in composition by then), scholarship! Check!

2005-2006 Scholarship! NO!!!!!!!!!!

The foundation refused to give me the 3rd year I was supposed to have, on account that I was still doing an MPhil and had not upgraded to PhD status!

So I panicked. And what’s even better, we got our second son, Kostas. That was definitely bad timing! But we did want a second child so… Blessed be he.

And thus I started working. As a composer in computer games. not a whole lot of money, but better than working in Tescos or IKEA or something. In other words my career started picking up.

After a hectic summer (2007), where I didn’t have any vacation, and left my family in Greece, while I was in London working, I upgraded to PhD level, on the 7th of September.

And today I got word that my scholarship has been renewed and that the money have been deposited in my account (will take a few days to be cleared though).

I’m one lucky son of a bitch!

And for the record. I do feel lucky, but know completely well that I deserve every bit of what I call luck!

It is finally done! After much troubling to Vince XII and my friend Mike at Young Composers I have at last my own blog to post.

Well I think that what needs to be said is that I have plenty of things on my mind and this is just the right place to start sharing them. Things like my PhD, my career in the computer games industry, CGEmpire, and many other which will come eventually to be posted here.

So for now, I really have to fix the blog to my liking and add a button to my main page, so that people can actually arrive here and read all my postings.