Beautiful piece that is very under appreciated. Wow this was made all the way back in 2012?! I would love to see you play this again just to hear how much you have improved over the years!

Ted N

6y↑1

Cameron Bartlett hey! Finally someone knows this piece. It's been a while, I'll give it a shot!

Cameron Bartlett

TN I had this piece downloaded on a little MP3 player I had bought for like $12 at a Family Dollar around my sophomore year of high school which was about 2010. I actually ended up frying that MP3 player or file welding in the school shop one day I had to find it again it took me awhile because it's the only name I knew it by was Trickwater which is what it always said on a little digital display of the MP3 player XD! I I am honestly stunned that you are still the only person on YouTube I've seen play this!

Ted N

6y↑1

dude that's a sick story! I found the song back when i was on my windows XP computer and the windows media player had an internet option. Somehow I found and it, and told myself that if I can one day play this song then I'd have accomplish everything I ever wanted in piano. That must have been 2007 or 2008. fastforward to my senior year of HS, I make an attempt to play it. I didn't play it perfectly, but I was pretty proud of myself (:

Apparently, this song came from a group called "OC Remix" and they remix a bunch of game songs into pretty awesome stuff. This one was done by Kevin Stephens and Trickwaters. I don't think ANYONE really knows this song, which is such a shame because there's definitely an amazing introduction in the beginning, going to a high point, then resting, finding it's way, building momentum, and finally hitting it's climax. (I still can't nail the ending though, it's a series of fast chords I have no idea how the performer did it)

Anyways, if you look up what song this is based on--you'll find that it's based on a melody from the late 1990s that was SUPER simple, and you had to play it on a old 8bit music program to actually get it to run on the computer. It's crazy!!! TBH the original one is pretty haunting, but KS and TW made it so beautiful.

Cameron Bartlett

To be honest I never could find the tune in any of the versions I played that this song was based on, unfortunately I I'm very limited on the games seeing how some of the FE games never made it to the US which is a damn shame as they truly are a wonderful games. Though the remake of the first game Fire Emblem: The Shadow Dragon, which I did play, had a tune in it that vaguely reminded me of the song but it was questionable if it was the same song as it was vastly different sounding except for a few little parts in it. Do you happen to know of the name of the original? I would actually love to hear the sorce that inspired KS and TW to make this piece, or if you know which Fire Emblem game it was originally in.

Ted N

it's based on "story 3 - conversation. From Fire emblem : the shadow dragon and blade of light 1990. I'd post the link, but I think youtube is preventing me. Just look this up on youtube "OC ReMix #1287: Fire Emblem 'Etude for Piano in F# minor' [Story 3] by Kevin Stephens & trickwaters"

Christine Meine

I know this is an older upload but holy cow, so impressive. How long did it take you to learn this? It's been sitting in my bench for years....

Ted N

Haha good question! I believe it took me around 5 months of playing 6 hours every week (though I was also practicing other pieces at the same time) to have it ready for the christmas recital, but even then I wasn't too happy at the speed I could play it . The trickiest part of this piece would be the octave jumps with both left and right hands (around 1:10). You can see in the video sometimes I don't do it perfectly. And at the time i tensed up way too much while doing octaves by using my wrists instead of my fingers for power ( which eventually causes repetitive strain injuries) . I've been wanting to do a redo of this piece but I haven't gotten around to doing it. I will say my favorite part is 3:20 and onwards. It's extremely beautiful to me--how it continually adds on and on and rolls into a emotional snowball. That it in itself makes it worth it to learn this piece!

I must say though, I attempted the piece at around level 10 in the certificate of merit auditions (which is a piano certification thing california). I played pieces like Khachaturian's Toccata, Bach's Prelude and Fugue BWV 847, or Beethoven's Sonata op. 2. no.1 and took private lessons for about 5 years before I felt confident enough to try it. I was always looking at this piece during those years though. So make sure you've got the basics down like playing octaves, arpeggios (you can see the left hand runs a lot)

I don't want that to discourage you though! You may never be ready haha, you just gotta go for it. Or get to the level where you can--because I wouldn't want you to get carpal tunnel either. I eventually did two years after this video, but that's because I had bad habits. Having a teacher really helps with accountability. Good luck!!!

Oak Thielbar

Hey, Oak here (formerly Kevin Stephens). This is the only recording of the piece that I've ever found, and I really appreciate the time you took to record and upload it (not to mention learning the piece!). I think your interpretation is excellent - in fact, I really enjoyed that you took some of the passages slower than the OCR recording. It brings out a more melancholic feeling in those sections and sounds great. Thank you again. :)

Ted N

Oh shoot!!! No way!! Dude I can't describe how excited to read your comment! This piece is THE ENTIRE REASON I persisted playing the piano. I heard this piece in 7th grade and I was finally able to play it in my final year in high school. Barely! It was very challening but it pushed me to become better. I don't think I did it justice--especially the ending. I just couldn't get it up to speed. How did you learn to compose like that? Each section is a such a moving chapter in a story

Oak Thielbar

@Ted N I'm really honored that it had such a positive impact on your life. I thought your rendition was great, actually - especially the ending! When I wrote it initially, I really loved adding dramatic flourishes to everything, and the ending at "full speed" is very, very dramatic. Now that I'm older, I look back at some of those tendencies and wish I had calmed down a bit. When I heard the ending section in this recording, I was surprised to find how much more of the overall mood is conveyed than in the OCR recording - whether you intended for it to be or not, I think your version is more expressive.

As for your question, I learned to compose probably the same way you learned to play piano - I practiced a hell of a lot! :D I experimented, I listened to a ton of music, and I had a PHENOMENAL instructor for music theory for a year. For every composition I've ever released, there are dozens of compositions that are either incomplete or just sloppy. But all of those crappy pieces and failures were a form of practice, and they gave me the skills I needed to write something like this when the inspiration hit.

And I want to make sure to credit Patrick Waters. I may have written the arrangement, but he was really responsible for a lot of what made the OCR recording so great - he did all of the sequencing of the piano, and as an actual pianist, he was able to bring elements to it that I simply couldn't on my own. He even pointed out a couple of passages in my original version which were essentially unplayable so that I could fix them - so he had a hand in shaping the arrangement as well.

Anyway, I tend to ramble. I hope that playing the piano still brings you joy. This recording has certainly brought joy to me.

Ted N

5y↑1

@Oak Thielbar My goodness, Oak! I am blown out of this world with your compliments! truthfully i did not intend it--I just couldn't get it up to speed at the time. I love drama, and there was a LOT of it in this piece.

I'm delighted to know had such a great learning experience. Mistakes is all part of the learning process. They say writing is re-writing. May I ask what are you doing now?

Wow! In original recording, was it Patrick that played the piece? At the time I played it, I seriously thought the ending was impossible to play at that speed.

It still does! I may not play as I used to, but I'm re-learning it to retain my roots. I'm working on Clair De Lune right now, just by myself. I plan to redo this piece right after.

Oak Thielbar

@Ted N Patrick didn't technically play the piece. He was (is? I haven't kept up with him for a while) a skilled pianist, but he didn't have the time to learn the piece on top of his studies. He programmed the piano performance (you'd have to ask him for all of the details on just exactly how he went about it), and he also mixed and mastered the recording.

I know that he did his best to render the piece in a way that could be performed. He once provided feedback on another piece I had arranged, informing me that no human could play a certain passage the way I'd written it (which was great feedback!). For my part, I am at best a novice when it comes to playing the piano; I just wrote what I thought would sound good. :)

As for what I'm up to these days, I'm a software developer. I haven't really created much music for ~10 years now. I spent a few years making ambient/drone/experimental music under the moniker Saffron Slumber, and I worked with a good friend on a project called earthbreather, but that's about it. I'm sure musical inspiration will revisit me someday, but for now, it's just a lot of coding. ;)