[PC] CrossCode - "Lea!" by Greg

[Zeta]

Submission Information:
Series: Other
Game: CrossCode
Console: PC
Title: Lea!
Instrumentation Solo Piano
Arranger: Greg

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[Greg]

About time I started submitting my stuff from this game, really.

[Khunjund]

First, I'd like to thank you for bringing this game to my attention. I've checked the developers' website (I have to say, they have a healthy sense of humour), and I'm seriously considering buying it. Also, the soundtrack is awesome.


To start off, there are a few bass notes that are incorrect:

• Measures 7 and 23, beat four should be D# instead of E.
• Measures 8 and 24, beat four should be E# instead of E.
• Measures 10 and 26, beat four should be D# instead of C#.
• Measures 18, beat two should be F# instead of E (like in measure 34).
• Measures 18 and 34, beat four should be Fn instead of E.
• Measure 58, beat two should be spelled B# instead of Cn.
• Measure 61, beat one should be E instead of C#.
• Measure 72, beat four should be E instead of F#.

Also, for the areas you've octaviated (e.g. measures 14–15, etc.), I don't think it'd be too difficult to play the actual heights, but that's up to you.


Now onto the arrangement.

In measures 2 and 4, you should put staccatos on the notes in the right hand which are part of the accompaniment, otherwise people will play them like they're part of the melody (especially since all the dyads are thirds, so it's easy to think they're part of the same line). I also recommend slurring the melody notes to further distinguish them, like so:

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Another option to avoid confusion would be to have the E-G# thirds combined into the left hand, with hooks around them to show they're meant to be played with the right

It's up to you, but you could also notate the melody in the following section using portato (slurred staccatos) if you want.

For measures 5, 6, 9, and 10, I'd keep the two layers. I know later on you have more than two voices and you need to combine them, but, especially in measures 5–6, you really want people to be able to notice the theme. For this reason, I'd also do away with the high B in measure 5: you don't want harmony notes obscuring the melody during the latter's first appearance—later on, it's not a problem. See how much easier it is to recognize the G#-F#-G# motif like this:

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(Either hide the half rest in measure 7 or lower it so it's sitting on the fourth line in the staff.)

If you really want extra clarity, you could even write measures 8–9 like this:

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When you have a few nonstaccato notes in an otherwise entirely staccato environment (e.g. measures 11–12), I recommend slurring them to the following note for clarity. Similarly, I'd slur the violin phrases starting in measures 13, 15, and 17.

Since it's awkward to give separate articulations to two voices with overlapping notes in measure 16, I'd replace the B of the solo violin with the F# of the accompaniment violins—they meet up on G# all the same in the following measure.

I hear the harp arpeggio in measure 20 as an A-Cn dyad, followed by F#, E, Dn.


For measures 21–36, practically every chord is a densely voiced 9th or 13th chord; the harmony is a lot more lush, and I feel like your current two-part harmonization doesn't do it justice. Moreover, as is, we're completely missing out on some of the more impactful chord changes, like in measures 32 and 34. This is how I would do it, personally:

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...and so on.

You don't have to play the melody at its original height and you don't have to double it in octaves, but I highly suggest you keep the harmony as intact as possible. If it gets unrealistic for the right hand to cover everything, consider adding notes to the left hand to fill out the harmony. Take a look at "my version" of measures 31–32:

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It's impractical for me to get the 7th of the B9sus4 and E13 chords with the right hand, so I add them to the left.

I don't hear a B carrying over from measure 35 to 36. What I hear is this:

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Which I might turn into something like this:

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I don't see the point of omitting the bass in measure 45, since the right hand is free to play the chord, and in 47, omitting the bass completely changes the harmony, so I recommend changing the voicing instead of leaving notes out—maybe something like this:

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On that note, the chord in measure 54 is F#min9 (the same voice that goes B>A in measures 51–52 goes G#>A in 53–54), the chords in measures 55–56 are B9sus4>B9, in root position (if you want the chord to sound heavier, you can just put more of the extensions in the lower register—you don't need to invert it), and the chord in measure 57 is a full C#maj9 (which is why the Cn should be spelled B#), so that whole stretch might look a bit more like this:

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I was wondering why you chose to put all the harp notes in the left hand for measures 59–64 instead of having them weaving around the melody in the right hand, like in measures 5–12. I don't have a problem with this per se (except maybe the raw major seventh in measure 62), but I find it's been applied rather inconsistently, and at times it interferes with the actuall bass line (like in measure 61). In any case, I find the harmony to be lacking here as well; measure 59 should be Fmin7, measure 60 should be B9, measure 61 is F#min7/E, and measures 63 and 64 should have the third. (Also, for this whole section, I recommend writing half notes instead of quarter notes followed by quarter rests, because, while the bells do only strike once, they're left to ring, and the texture definitely doesn't give the impression that there are moments of silence.)

I think measure 65 would sound better if you voiced it with G# instead of C# in the left hand to spread out the notes a bit more and avoid the octave of emptiness™ between the left and right hands.

I'm pretty sure the grace notes in measure 65 should be E#>G#, and not D#>E#.

For 67–70, I'd use the same rootless 9th chord voicing for everything. (I don't think the bass goes from F# to E in measure 70, and even if it did, you'd lose out in chord colour to include it, so I still don't think it'd be a good idea.) Also, you could fill out the chord in measure 71 a bit more, and I recommend rearticulating a few chord notes in measures 73–74 to keep a bit of the harmonic drive towards the loop—you can still leave enough room for the top notes to be clear, and you can write it in two layers to push that distinction even further. (You could also include the little whistle in measure 72, if you want.)

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[Greg]

Whoa, really appreciate the detailed feedback! I'm busy over the next few days (holiday stuff) but I'll work on your suggestions as soon as I get the chance.

Highly recommend the game if you're on the fence, 50 hours for 20 bucks is a steal and everything about it is really well-executed.
EDIT: also it's on sale for $15 atm so now's your chance!

[Greg]

Taking a closer read and holy smokes I must have missed a lot of stuff. I got time to fix a few things so I took care of some of the easier problems to solve: just want to have a record of what I actually did.

To start off, there are a few bass notes that are incorrect:

• Measures 7 and 23, beat four should be D# instead of E.
• Measures 8 and 24, beat four should be E# instead of E.
• Measures 10 and 26, beat four should be D# instead of C#.
• Measures 18, beat two should be F# instead of E (like in measure 34).
• Measures 18 and 34, beat four should be Fn instead of E.
• Measure 58, beat two should be spelled B# instead of Cn.
• Measure 61, beat one should be E instead of C#.
• Measure 72, beat four should be E instead of F#.

This is really stuff that I should have gotten the first time around, thanks for catching all of it. Fixed everything except the last bullet point (I assumed you were referring to m. 71): I listened to it again and I still hear F# there.

I'm pretty sure the grace notes in measure 65 should be E#>G#, and not D#>E#.

Fixed.

[Greg]

Some more changes. I'm still not done with all of your feedback yet so this is mostly bookkeeping for me, although I do have a question for you at the end.

In measures 2 and 4, you should put staccatos on the notes in the right hand which are part of the accompaniment, otherwise people will play them like they're part of the melody (especially since all the dyads are thirds, so it's easy to think they're part of the same line). I also recommend slurring the melody notes to further distinguish them, like so:

Another option to avoid confusion would be to have the E-G# thirds combined into the left hand, with hooks around them to show they're meant to be played with the right

Honestly, I hear these as part of the melody! They have the same instrumentation as the melody after all... I left them as is for now, but I added slurs anyway.

For measures 5, 6, 9, and 10, I'd keep the two layers. I know later on you have more than two voices and you need to combine them, but, especially in measures 5–6, you really want people to be able to notice the theme. For this reason, I'd also do away with the high B in measure 5: you don't want harmony notes obscuring the melody during the latter's first appearance—later on, it's not a problem. See how much easier it is to recognize the G#-F#-G# motif like this:

(Either hide the half rest in measure 7 or lower it so it's sitting on the fourth line in the staff.)

If you really want extra clarity, you could even write measures 8–9 like this:

Done. I moved the high B you mentioned down an octave.

When you have a few nonstaccato notes in an otherwise entirely staccato environment (e.g. measures 11–12), I recommend slurring them to the following note for clarity. Similarly, I'd slur the violin phrases starting in measures 13, 15, and 17.

Since it's awkward to give separate articulations to two voices with overlapping notes in measure 16, I'd replace the B of the solo violin with the F# of the accompaniment violins—they meet up on G# all the same in the following measure.

I hear the harp arpeggio in measure 20 as an A-Cn dyad, followed by F#, E, Dn.

Done.

For measures 21–36, practically every chord is a densely voiced 9th or 13th chord; the harmony is a lot more lush, and I feel like your current two-part harmonization doesn't do it justice. Moreover, as is, we're completely missing out on some of the more impactful chord changes, like in measures 32 and 34. This is how I would do it, personally:

...and so on.

You don't have to play the melody at its original height and you don't have to double it in octaves, but I highly suggest you keep the harmony as intact as possible. If it gets unrealistic for the right hand to cover everything, consider adding notes to the left hand to fill out the harmony. Take a look at "my version" of measures 31–32:

It's impractical for me to get the 7th of the B9sus4 and E13 chords with the right hand, so I add them to the left.

I don't hear a B carrying over from measure 35 to 36. What I hear is this:

Which I might turn into something like this:

Alright, I made a lot of changes here. Ended up going with a harmonization which is more subdued than you gave in your examples. I'm probably going to fiddle with this more later to make better usage of the LH.

I think measure 65 would sound better if you voiced it with G# instead of C# in the left hand to spread out the notes a bit more and avoid the octave of emptiness™ between the left and right hands.

I'm pretty sure the grace notes in measure 65 should be E#>G#, and not D#>E#.
For 67–70, I'd use the same rootless 9th chord voicing for everything. (I don't think the bass goes from F# to E in measure 70, and even if it did, you'd lose out in chord colour to include it, so I still don't think it'd be a good idea.)

Done. (At m. 67-70 I hear a slightly different harmony from what you gave so that's what I wrote in.)

I don't see the point of omitting the bass in measure 45, since the right hand is free to play the chord, and in 47, omitting the bass completely changes the harmony, so I recommend changing the voicing instead of leaving notes out—maybe something like this:

So the example you gave here doesn't look playable via normal methods. Is the intended interpretation using the sostenuto pedal to hold the bass chord? (I considered the sustain pedal but I think it muddies the RH too much...)
Similar question re: the whistle near the end of the piece.

[Khunjund]

Some more changes. I'm still not done with all of your feedback yet so this is mostly bookkeeping for me, although I do have a question for you at the end.

So would you rather I discuss with you as you make these changes, or would you prefer if I waited for you to finish everything before giving a second round of feedback?

So the example you gave here doesn't look playable via normal methods. Is the intended interpretation using the sostenuto pedal to hold the bass chord? (I considered the sustain pedal but I think it muddies the RH too much...)
Similar question re: the whistle near the end of the piece.

Actually, this question had popped up in my head as I was going over your sheet before: do you actually intend for this to be played without pedal? Yes, I expected the sustain pedal to be used here, and personally, I'd also make use of it in a number of other places. Here's a recording of me playing measures 45 to 57 (and this is on my garbage straight piano and recorded on my phone, mind you); I played exactly what I had written (using the regular sustain pedal), and yet I think the melody is still sufficiently clear. I was taught that you can always add pedal as long as you use the proper technique and maintain a good balance regarding the sound.

[Greg]

Probably better for me to finish up, I think. There's some parts I've gone over once which could probably be improved more.

I definitely intended some pedal usage in other places, I just wasn't sure about that spot specifically. The recording is convincing, though, so I'll make that change.

[Greg]

Alright, think I'm finished for the time being: did the rest of your suggested changes. I also added more of the harp notes in m. 59-64.

[JDMEK5]

Hey bud; looks very nice!

Just a few things:
- Measures 45, 49; LH: Just for clarity, I'd like to suggest some kind of explicit indication for the RH to cover the top part of these big chords. I know it's already fairly obvious but clarity is always key- make it foolproof. Also pedal indications could be powerful here; just consider it. It's necessary to hold these chords down anyways though so I would actually say you should probably add them in. Again, make it foolproof.
- Measure 72, RH: I would break the beam between these two triplet groupings. It just looks kind of ambiguous... also unusual.
- Measure 18, RH: Slight clash between stem of last quarter note and the slur above. Very small detail.
- Measure 7, RH: I notice you've been taking very meticulous and particular care towards your slur placements and voicings, which makes me wonder about the first two beats in this measure. Since they belong to the melody (which you have notated in the first voice both before and after), why are these two notes in the second voice? Just seems kinda broken up to me.

[Greg]

- Measures 45, 49; LH: Just for clarity, I'd like to suggest some kind of explicit indication for the RH to cover the top part of these big chords. I know it's already fairly obvious but clarity is always key- make it foolproof. Also pedal indications could be powerful here; just consider it. It's necessary to hold these chords down anyways though so I would actually say you should probably add them in. Again, make it foolproof.

Added some m.d. markings to those chords. I'm kind of reluctant to add explicit pedal markings there, honestly... it feels like if I prescribe the pedal usage there, I'll have to do it everywhere for consistency (or it may be interpreted as requiring no pedal usage elsewhere), and that seems needlessly cumbersome.

- Measure 72, RH: I would break the beam between these two triplet groupings. It just looks kind of ambiguous... also unusual.
- Measure 18, RH: Slight clash between stem of last quarter note and the slur above. Very small detail.
- Measure 7, RH: I notice you've been taking very meticulous and particular care towards your slur placements and voicings, which makes me wonder about the first two beats in this measure. Since they belong to the melody (which you have notated in the first voice both before and after), why are these two notes in the second voice? Just seems kinda broken up to me.

Done, done, and done.

Thanks for the feedback!

[Libera]

So it looks like this has had a lot of work with regards to fixing notes etc.  But I feel like there are some more fundamental issues with the sheet as it currently stands.

1. I'd highly recommend doubling all of the bar lengths and the note values.  I understand that doing that is a massive pain, so I've done most of the heavy lifting for you.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/6o2li68vsmkk7vb/CrossCode%20-%20Lea%21%20%28Libera%20Edit%29.musx?dl=1
Most of the things left to do are fixing slurs, ties and dealing with some collisions and it'd be best if you made it look how you want it to so I left that for you to do.  The reasoning behind these changes is at the moment I feel is the note lengths currently used don't currently give the correct feel.  Particularly phrases like bars 23-26 (using the bar numbers in my version) look very odd to me written with crotchets rather than quavers.  Also this piece makes more sense to me with the bars twice as long.  Although the harmony generally changes every two beats, I don't think that necessarily means that the piece is in two time.

2.  I personally had a hard time following your arrangement while listening to the original, and the reason for this is that the way the piece is currently written has different parts drop in and out frequently with the melody being heavily obscured on the sheet most of the time.  Doing that sort of thing is fine as a transcription, but as an arrangement it doesn't really make a lot of musical sense.  This problem occurs in bars 3-10 and again in bars 29-32 (again, using my version's bar numbers).

3.  Regarding articulations, there are places where there are staccatos on practically every note and I feel like they start to lose their meaning after a while and serve to make things look quite cluttered.  I'd focus on placing the staccatos either more precisely (i.e. use less of them) or give a direction instead of articulating every note.

The notes are there, it's just a matter of making this arrangement more readable and pianistic.  I think it's a tricky piece to put onto piano, and you've made a pretty good attempt at it so far.  Let me know if you need any help or clarification with any of this.

[Khunjund]

I'd highly recommend doubling all of the bar lengths and the note values.

Time to rewrite this in 2/1.

Honestly, I also think it looks better in 4/4, but I recognize that this is rather subjective, and I don't think using 2/2 isn't incorrect per se.

I do, however, disagree quite strongly with your beaming choices.

Measure 72, RH: I would break the beam between these two triplet groupings. It just looks kind of ambiguous... also unusual.

Considering this is 2/2, it should be one continuously beamed eighth note sextuplet, not triplets. Also, I recommend making the final A of that flourish a quarter note and showing the following quarter rest, for rythmic clarity. It's fine to hide stuff like this if another layer marks the missing rythms, but this isn't the case here.

Honestly, I hear these as part of the melody! They have the same instrumentation as the melody after all... I left them as is for now, but I added slurs anyway.

I hear them as two accompaniment notes followed by two "melody" notes, mainly because there is no E there in the original—it's just a hollow seventh between A and G#—but adding the E on piano helps mellow out this dissonance, so I guess it's fine this way too.

As for the rest, I just have a few voicings (and other touch-ups) I'd like to suggest—it's up to you whether to follow them or not:

• In measure 20, you could drop the half note F# to give the melody some room. In this case, you could also cut the half note Cn, because it's already being played above, and it would keep your second layer consistently on one voice. Alternatively, you could do something like this:
  
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• I'm positive the chord in measure 28 is Cmin9, and the chord in measure 29 is F#13.
• Consider putting a courtesy A natural in measure 30.
• I'd repeat the D natural on beat three of measure 32, just to really get that E13 sound.
• Consider dropping the D natural in measure 34 for convenience (or at least moving it up an octave, to get a structure like in measure 25—which I don't find ideal, because of the second interval between top melody note and chord, but it can still work).
• In measure 37, you follow my even-between-both-hands spread-out voicing, but from measure 51 to 57, you use dense everything-in-the-left-hand voicings, which looks inconsistent to me. I'd suggest you follow my recommended voicings a bit more closely, but then again, if this sounds good to you, so be it.
• Measure 59: same thing as measure 34. This ninth voicing isn't unplayable, but it's not very pianistic either.
• You could cut the B in the chord at the start of measure 60: it's not necessary (the bass already plays it), and it would keep your right-hand chord voicings for this section consistently at four notes.
• I guess you could add the little arpeggio in measure 65, if you want.
• Similar to what I've said above, I think you could drop the right hand A in 71 to make the melody stand out more.

People, for the love of God, please stop making lists with hyphens. As musicians, I'd assume you had some aesthetic sensibilities.

[Libera]

I do, however, disagree quite strongly with your beaming choices.

It's just something that finale messed up when I made my file and I forgot to change it.  I've already had a chat with Greg and he's in the process of fixing that along with the other stuff I mentioned.

[Khunjund]

Do you think you could use the appropriate channel in the Discord server then, instead of doing it in private?

Or is it that you think I'm interfering with you?