Over the years, I’ve had many requests for sheet music for the music I compose for games. The problem is that music is owned by the companies who make the games, and they usually aren’t interested in making sheet music available. So I’ve decided to make an album of all original music entitled “The Lost Levels” and offer the sheet music to accompany it. Included will be a playalong version of the track that’s missing the melody line so musicians can play along with a virtual orchestra!
The premiere piece, entitled “The First Spell” is downloadable for free below. You can grab the full track in mp3 format and learn the tune (or just to enjoy!-) then download the sheet music for your instrument (C treble and bass clef, Bb, and Eb) and play along!
Writing out music notation is a lot of work – even with a computer notation program like Sibelius or Finale, you still have to make small tweaks and add articulation and dynamic markings manually, and make sure lines are playable by humans, with enough rest and in the range of typical players… and on and on.
Now I’m not sure of the actual interest level out there – will anyone actually download, learn, and play these tunes? Are they too hard or too easy? Will it be worth my time to make it available? What instruments should I support? Is there interest for fuller arrangements, or arrangements for duets or trios? To help answer these questions I’ve got a couple ideas:
1) The Lost Levels Let’s Playalong Challenge! I’d like to challenge anyone who downloads the music to make a vid of them playing along and post it to YouTube! Send me your link and I’ll check it out! The winner gets to suggest a style or type of composition to be included on the album – want me to write an exciting action piece for trumpet, or a lullaby for piano, or a mysterious concerto for bass? Then download the track and the sheet music for your instrument below, and start practicing!
I’ll announce a submission deadline in a week or so here on my site.
2) I need people to spread the word as far and wide as possible! As an incentive, I’ll release the next track of The Lost Levels when downloads of the playalong track hit 100… if it never hits 100, we’ll know that there’s not a lot of interest… but I promise I will finish the album in any case!
This is going to be a giant experiment and I’m genuinely curious as to how it’s going to be received. If this is something you’d like to see more of, please help get the word out to anybody who might be interested and I’ll try to accommodate the interested. Also please leave any questions or thoughts you may have in the comments and we’ll figure this out.
As always, thanks for listening – I can’t wait to listen back!-) Here’s the download links… just right-click on the button and do a Save Linked File.
The First Spell – Full Track
The First Spell – Playalong Track
Sheet Music in C – The First Spell
Sheet Music in Bb – The First Spell
Sheet Music in Eb – The First Spell
Sheet Music in C (Bass Clef) – The First Spell
The First Spell by Nelson Everhart is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License… so you can remix and repost all you want! #letsplayalong!