Hi there,
This is one of the first “real” songs I’ve ever wrote and one I’d already presented live a few times, just guitar and voice.
I’ve been trying for quite a long time to figure out the right arrangement for it, and I think I’m finally happy with the result now.
I’ve tried to make the most subtle arrange possible, letting the nylon-string arpeggio lead the song along with the voice. I don’t feel much confident working with synth drum sounds (even if I like the idea of using them) so I’ve just used the Black Pearl kit in Hydrogen, as I do often.
I’ve also experimented with an Hammond plugin for the fist time and loved working with it. Originally I had strings doing that part, but I was never really happy with the result.
To make sure the loudness would be the best possible, once broadcasted, I’ve tried to do some mastering in Ardour this time (instead of just dropping my mix in Soundcloud). Nothing too technical, I’ve just created a new Session, imported the song and played with the limiter and did some subtle EQ modifications. I’d even check the LUFS information, something I was completely unaware of before. The result was significantly better.
As for the song itself, it’s an acoustic ballad sung in Portuguese, and the title could be translated in something like “As One Star”. The vocal performance is quite challenging for me now, since when I wrote the song I could reach easier the high notes. I even could sing the chorus in falsetto back then!
NOTE: The only thing I’m not satisfied with in the mix is the guitar. It got itself eated up by the bass and, to me at least, it’s barely audible. I’m realizing that it’s no easy to mix nylon-string guitars when you have bass and other instruments in the arrangement. I’ve tried to fix this working with the panning but I don’t think I got it this time.
So, I think that’s it. Hope you like this one.