Hello all, hope you are well.
Here is a new piece I completed, “Echos Of Byzantium.” This is a hybrid orchestral Middle Eastern fantasy piece. I’ve been reading a lot about ancient Canaanite and Phoenician cities and culture and read the novel City Of Brass by Shannon Chakraborty which is where I was inspired to write this track (READ THE NOVEL IT’S FANTASTIC!)
I can’t say much about the structure of this song. As a heavy metal guitarist for 30 years, I think I tend to write orchestral stuff like it’s rock music sometimes and I think that is the case here, but also I tend to write with a classic Golden Age of Hollywood style as well, so it’s an odd mixture.
The piece moves between G and B Phrygian/Phrygian Dominant scales (I think?) to give it that Middle Eastern vibe, but I also tried to give it a bit of a Hollywood fantasy sound as well, using regular harmonic cadences like V - I and V/V between the modal harmony. It’s 108 bpm with a rallentando to 70 at the end.
Instruments/orchestration: Used mostly Orchestral Tools’ Berlin Orchestra, but layered the violins I, violas and celli with Spitfire studio strings in strategic spots for detail and East West Hollywood brass for some of the horn parts. The vocals are from Zero-G Etherea. A smattering of different pads from OT and a ney (ancient flute) for texture. All mixed and mastered in Studio One 6 with iZotope Ozone. Also this is the first time using iZotope’s new Plasma saturation plugin.