1. Yearning a Form
   APZX
2. Winter's End
   Kat
3. The Whispering Forest of Chalcedony
   TheVodouQueen

APZX, the beautiful variety of synths captured amorphous and form amazingly well. The gentle beats accompanied the airy, breathy elements very well. It's structure was clear and fitting. Loved your variations too. Very beautiful.

Kat, the metal-kit elements flowed wonderfully with the strings and other symphonic elements. I love the rising action of the song that poetically gives way to the gentler orchestral half of the piece that softly fades like snow melting away in spring.

TheVodouQueen, a wonderfully whimsical tune that marries elements of electronic, lo-fi, and atmospheric accoustics. I do indeed here some familiar elements from some of The WIngless's works (I love that artist's work on OCR). I detected some mixing issues with the piano-sounding synth (at least I think it's a synth? Kinda like a rhode piano.) It often sounds like it's clipping against the sound ceiling, coming off a tad loud. I believe it should be easy to reduce that effect some to improve the sound quality. I love the dreamy themes of the song. The sweeping pads with warm accoustic guitar, electric atmosphere, it is a lovely style.

You bonus people... Hoboka's mix is quite faithful and still uniquely expressive. Soft, dreamy, and evocative. Lovely synths. Beautiful. Simply beautiful.
Souperion, you killed me with that mana beast orca call at the beginning. The strings take the lead quite nicely as the orchestral elements waltzed with the delicate synths. I love the gentle choral parts. The men's humming was quite calming and a warm bass to the piece.

1. The Whispering Forest of Chalcedony
   TheVodouQueen
2. Winter's End
   Kat
3. Upon His Shoulders, the World's Wishes
   Wassup Thunder

The Whispering Forest of Chalcedony - You say the word quiet and honestly I am not sure you understand what "quiet" actually means. Like I got my track to a decent level, but this straight up swamps mine in terms of overall level. There is clipping all over the place. With that said, I love this track. Great ideas, well executed in terms of composition, and actually really great use of space.

Winter's End - Definitely not what I was expecting in terms of a sound palette. I mean I could get behind the intro guitar, but then some proper distorted guitars come in. Well that was a bit on the surprising side haha. Plus some proper string ensemble work as well. Just was not what I was expecting from this is about all I can say lol.

Upon His Shoulders, the World's Wishes - Well you certainly did not wait for nuthing. Aight. Perhaps really the only big complaint about that intro is you simply didn't bring the low registers in at all. The big bells are definitely fitting, and the transition to the piano, was actually much smoother than I thought it would be. And honestly I think really the biggest issue here is the distinct lack of that lower register. It just isn't present :(

(BONUS)Secret Snow Keys - Love the choir. In fact this entire thing has an almost "icey" vibe to it. But really just like Wassup Thunder's entry. There just isn't anything in the bottom end :( These kinds of tracks allow for such a wonderful & luscious low end.

A Gentle Desire (BONUS ENTRY) - I really dig the combo of real & synthetic instruments here. Again I really don't here any low end :( This disappoints me A LOT. Like, I'm telling y'all low end in these tracks is SO easy. It can just sound SO BIG with hardly any effort. But really this is a lovely rendition.

1. The Whispering Forest of Chalcedony
   TheVodouQueen
2. Winter's End
   Kat
3. Yearning a Form
   APZX

AZPX - Liked the atmosphere and stuff on the background.
TheVodouQueen - Nice vocals, loved the bells.

Kat - Great intro, enjoyed the rocking style.
Wassup Thunder - Energetic start and calming down, liked the build-up to the last part.

HoboKa - Good orchestral version.
Souperion - Nice arrangement, liked the last part

1. Winter's End
   Kat
2. The Whispering Forest of Chalcedony
   TheVodouQueen
3. Yearning a Form
   APZX

Kat Winter's End- I'd say this is the most MnP of the lot in terms of production and direction. Nice alternate rock + symphony vibe going on. Very tight. Love that the heavy section is about 1/4 in and the 2nd half takes a nice soft approach.

TVQ The Whispering Forest of Chalcedony: Loved the atmosphere going on here. Lyrics were OK, kinda wish there was more variety with them and that they hit the key more accurately (but I loved the vocal break at 5:23 with the Oooh ah ha ha...that was a nice touch), but eh...More pressingly, we got some clipping issues, most prevalent at 2:30 and 5:12 areas for me. I'd have to give it another 2-3 listens to catch 'em all.

APZX Yearning a Form - Nice bendy bass. Liked the bells too. This felt quite liberal for MnP though. But I did appreciate the swag synth solo. Nice risers and downers.

Wassup Thunder - Woahhh, the start is too loud. Wasn't really a fan of the violin lead, not sure why, but it doesn't sound very humanized and it's a bit shrill and dry. Nice wolf howl. The brass is pretty basic, but I can't cast stones since I can't do brass well either. The March band segue was a bit more leaning towards PRC than MNP...I kinda messed up the rules of MnP for the All Metroid's round...my bad lol. Anyways, hope to see you next round.

1. Upon His Shoulders, the World's Wishes
   Wassup Thunder
2. Winter's End
   Kat
3. Yearning a Form
   APZX

APZX - Is that bass clipping a little at the beginning? I hear some crackling. I love the panned perc. The arps and everything you've added are really cool.

TVQ - Sorry, I'm just not into the vocal samples. I appreciate what you've done here with the leitmotif and building a song around it with good instrumentation, but for me it doesn't really work, and I don't think it fits the idea of MnP. In fact, I think the piece would be pretty solid if you just deleted all the vocals.

hoboka - This was nice. You never let me vote for you anymore though :p

Kat - Ooh, interesting take on this. Subdued vocals, then metal, then acoustic guitars, then orchestra?! Very cool. I think the metal part could have been mixed a bit better (mainly by carving away frequencies in the rhythm guitars or backing off the distortion a bit or just turning them down) but overall I loved it.

Souperion - The abrupt cutoff on the string swells at the beginning is both compelling and a little strange. I really enjoyed how the piece fit together and evolved. Pleasant.

Wassup Thunder - Haha, nice intro. Just jumping right into things, huh? I love how it gets epic around 2:30. Teach me to orchestrate? You're so good.

1. Upon His Shoulders, the World's Wishes
   Wassup Thunder
2. The Whispering Forest of Chalcedony
   TheVodouQueen
3. Yearning a Form
   APZX

Wassup Thunder - While the orchestra didn't feel that full at times, the arrangement is very solid. I loved how you incorporated the main theme into it.

TheVodouQueen - The soundscape and mood in this is amazing. It's a bit more generous with the source than the other entrees but I think it captures the original song very well.

APZX - It's a pretty clean and simple arrangement but it does it well. I found the bass synth to be slightly distracting, but I did love the very ethereal sound you had going on when it dropped out.

1. Upon His Shoulders, the World's Wishes
   Wassup Thunder
2. Winter's End
   Kat
3. The Whispering Forest of Chalcedony
   TheVodouQueen

Wassup - the bellicose intro was a bit jarring at first but on relisten I like it and I have to appreciate the bold choice to go in that direction and I like how it makes the whole more dynamic. it feels a bit dry in some areas but I love this arrangement and the inclusion of Angel's Fear

Kat - still more than conservative enough IMO, there are some parts that I would have changed more which is one of the reasons I didn't enter this month. I would've liked to seen this developed further I like where it was going at the end

TVQ - this track is a bit bipolar for me, some parts of it could easily be my favorite of the round and other parts less so. the most objective thing I can bring up is that there is a lot clipping in this that it would be better off without, the instrumentals here are otherwise gorgeous but that really kills it. I also didn't think the vocal meshed that well with it all of the time but I also have to say it's growing on me with subsequent listens...

1. Upon His Shoulders, the World's Wishes
   Wassup Thunder
2. Winter's End
   Kat
3. Yearning a Form
   APZX

1: Wassup Thunder - "Upon His Shoulders, the World's Wishes":

* Blast of brass and percussion at the beginning spiked hard for me (by speakers)--a little less so by headphones. Might need some balancing or compression. I liked it, but it at the same time felt a bit too powerful too quick. It felt like it could've been eased into the beginning section to amp it up a bit, seeing as the same notes and softness seems to go on for a bit longer than I think (up till the wolves howl). The mix-up was good, but after listening to it a few more times it definitely felt like it could've been put in-between to recapture the listener's attention in an all-new light.

* That being said, LOVE the pure orchestral feel. Felt very Zelda / Lufia-ish, and I can imagine it being the protagonist's theme.

* Trumpets sounded a bit flat to me, unsure why. Maybe less-so flat and more-so 'synthetic' sounding. I could see it if it was purposeful, like you wanted to sound like NEs / SNES cart-music. Was it purposeful? :) I'm more-so curious than this being a real big downside. If not, then I'm unsure.

* Every other instrument sounds beautiful. For a near 1:1 rendition of the song, this (besides the bonuses) seemed to take it a bit more to the extreme, and played a lot more with instrumentation and production. I can hear that it's not exactly the same key or tempo, and you stretch it in a viable, realistic way, as if done by an actual orchestra. Well done. :)


2: Kat - "Winter's End":

* I love the intro with the haiku before we get heavy with the guitar solo.

* That said, I wish it was a bit louder and clearer. Both on headphones and speakers it sounded a bit muffled by the ambience behind it. . .

* Very 1:1, but at the same time, did not sound like a copy / paste of the song. Loved also the minimalist aspect of instruments. Not all songs need a huge number of multi-tracks to get its message across. :) And it fits well with haiku in general.

* Maybe just me with personal taste and bias, but it felt like the beginning could've gone more with an electric sitar or koto to go with the haiku / Japanese feel, but I am unsure if the guitar is simulated or real. Either way, impressive song despite conservativeness, and I can hear the effort put into it despite taking the minimalist approach.

3: APZX - "Yearning a Form":

* I really like how the synth comes out, like it's straight from the song, but slowly starts adding more synths and--in a way--transforming into something fuller over time (as the name and description suggests with the cloud).

* I like the little 'artistic input' (as I call 'em) about two-thirds the way into the song. Like...the transformation was complete, or coming to its apex, with the piano play / running of the keys outside the normal song.

* That said, I am a bit split on the song. Might be a bias from myself, but although this is a song about transformation, the 'transformative music', albeit subtle in a beautiful way, was still mighty conservative to the source. I felt a bit more play around, even messing with the tempo or key changes, would've or could've done more to the song. But then again, even in MnP I like to stretch boundaries and make it a challenge to myself to stay within the remits of the song (easy recognition, etc) while testing how far I can go. So again, might be more a personal bias. . .

* still loved the track :)

Others:

HoboKa - "Secret Snow Keys":

* Lovely synth-work (as always). IDK how you do it, but you always seem to manage to give much more ambient / amorphous-sounding songs a new breath of life (as you did with Lower Maridia). This song was probably the closest to the collar of its original incarnation, but was a joy to listen to. Felt like ice-skating music, or like a revamp of the original that definitely would've (or should've!) been used in the remake of the game. :)

Souperion - "A Gentle Desire":

* :0 Whale sounds! \o/ I don't remember it being in the game itself, but then again, I hadn't played it in awhile. Kudos for putting game sounds into the song. Very subtle and sneaky of you. ;)

* You said in your comment you wanted to stay more conservative in the arrangement. I think you nailed it, tbh. Despite the violin section pushing the boundaries a bit with interpretation around the notation, it came out lovelier for it. A kind of sad, yet hopeful and playful melody, with a heavier bottom to the instruments. Almost feels like it's meant for whales, or while whale watching under the ocean--which is a striking counterpoint to the more whimsical winter sounds halfway through the song. ...Made for whales in sub-arctic waters. ;) Again, beautiful piece. Definitely has that Souperion stamp on it with intricacy / focus on substance rather than form, as I've noticed in previous songs I've listened to of yours. :D