I've been listening to Copeland's music from Spyro for a while now, so I'm pretty familiar with his style.
From this I can generate a good rhythmic beat, bassline, and background guitar/warm pad/various effects.
Melodic solos, however, are the real challenge. In this case I might listen to a few songs to get an idea, or (as in my next piece with Dream Weavers) snag a riff and feature it completely.
Hopefully replicating Copeland's fluent melodies will become easier for me in the future!

To compose all my pieces I use Cakewalk's Music Creator 2 and a simple Yamaha keyboard. Eventually I'll move onto some other program that could better match the instruments in Copeland's soundtrack.

I uploaded "Spyro the dragon music" after about two weeks. One month later I took an afternoon to spice up my creation, now uploaded as "Spyro the dragon music 2". Consider it finalized, for now.

Cool. So I just listened to your older version and the remastered version you've shown is quite a quality difference.

Out of the curiousity, was there a specific song/tune from Copeland that you've studied first, or did you just listen to a whole bunch of Spyro songs and eventually nailed Copeland's style?
Also, what program did you use to compose the song? FL Studio? GarageBand? (which is what Copeland used for making the Spyro soundtracks)

ratchet wrote:

I've already Put It on my Ipod! I used Audacity to Record it and then converted the recording into MP3!

And that kills the quality.

Thanks, snowboarder.

No, not really! But It's not perfect

I've already Put It on my Ipod! I used Audacity to Record it and then converted the recording into MP3!

And that kills the quality.

Thanks, snowboarder.

Good observation, bmah. The basic frame of the piece was created in one night... but new rhythms, instruments and other small changes were tailored in days after.
I uploaded "Spyro the dragon music" after about two weeks. One month later I took an afternoon to spice up my creation, now uploaded as "Spyro the dragon music 2". Consider it finalized, for now.

There is a title for the piece RaidonMakoto, it's called Hilltop Forest.
A Myspace page with downloadable mp3's will be up soon. I'll keep you guys posted.

Wow. That sounds almost EXACTLY like Stewart Copeland. AWESOME work. Two questions;

1) Do you have a .mp3 or .midi that I can download? I want to put this on my iPod.
2) Does your song have an official title? I'd rather put that that "spyro the dragon music 2" as the title.

I've already Put It on my Ipod! I used Audacity to Record it and then converted the recording into MP3!

1) Do you have a .mp3 or .midi that I can download? I want to put this on my iPod.
2) Does your song have an official title? I'd rather put that that "spyro the dragon music 2" as the title.

Oh, I also noticed that you took into account some of those percussive elements like bells that help contribute to Copeland's style.

How long did it take to make this piece?

I couldn't really decide my favorite easily, but I voted for Dark Passage.

Very nice!!

It's quite mellow, like some of Copeland's Spyro music, but for some reason sounds a bit more skeletal. Maybe go for the soft rock stuff too? I was surprised at the lack of guitars in that piece. Copeland often uses both acoustic and electric guitars in his compositions.
You got the bass and piano pretty much like how he does it.

Looking forward to more.

Hmmm, yeah, It needed more Guitar I recon.

It's quite mellow, like some of Copeland's Spyro music, but for some reason sounds a bit more skeletal. Maybe go for the soft rock stuff too? I was surprised at the lack of guitars in that piece. Copeland often uses both acoustic and electric guitars in his compositions.
You got the bass and piano pretty much like how he does it.

Looking forward to more.