May 2011
1 post
1 tag
Rum & Gold: Live Recording Assembly (Part 1)
Hey everyone! Since I’ve been back from Ireland, I decided to take some time before I jump into new projects to assemble something from earlier in the year. I participated in an orchestral recording session dedicated to showcasing good orchestration among young composers in the Guild of Canadian Film Composers (now the Screen Composers Guild of Canada) and I was fortunate enough to...
April 2011
1 post
2 tags
MinoMonsters!
Hey everyone,
It’s been an exciting and productive spring and I look forward to being able to share more of what I’ve been working on when it becomes possible. To start things out though, I wanted to talk a bit about MinoMonsters.
MinoMonsters proves that good things happen when you combine collecting and battling monsters with social networking. It’s Pokémon for the current...
February 2011
1 post
2 tags
Supastar!
Hi guys!
I know it’s seemed quiet around here lately, but I promise it’s only because it’s actually been very loud and busy around the studio. I’ve been privileged with a lot of work these past few weeks ranging from game stuff to short films to advertising and a web series, so I apologize for the break in updates but I haven’t come up to breathe much.
That said, I...
January 2011
1 post
2 tags
Film Scoring Workshop
Recently I was asked to give an introductory workshop on the world of film music for a class of young directors. My specific aim was to introduce them to the process and advantages of working with a composer on their films in the future.
It covers a lot of ground and so is necessarily quite superficial on each point, and there are also areas where I’ve left nothing but a basic concept on...
December 2010
1 post
1 tag
Golden Sun Rising
For those who don’t know this, I first got into writing music by arranging game tunes, so I’ve always had a soft spot for the world of video game arrangements.
Since it’s been a long time since I did one (way back when I did this Halo theme medley), I decided to use some of my time over the holidays to put together a new arrangement. The game in question is a wonderful old RPG...
November 2010
3 posts
2 tags
WatchThis weekend, I finished work on a particularly special short film. The film in question which you can watch above, Connection, is the first major film project created by my girlfriend, the up-and-coming director, Shannon Litt.
Obviously a labour of love, the film was nevertheless legitimately rewarding to score, with many emotional peaks and valleys over the course of its 6 minute length....
3 tags
Deep: Available Now on BandCamp!
The time has come.
It’s been a busy and exciting couple of months of work, but I’m proud to announce that Deep is finally finished!
The album clocks in at just under 40 minutes. You can grab the tracks individually, and folks who buy the full album will be in for a surprise gift from me to you. Plus, I’ve made the first track free for everyone to download so feel free to...
2 tags
A Concept Album Introduction
Hey all!
Soooo it’s been a while since I’ve shared something, right? Well my apologies for that. I’ve been working a lot and haven’t really had time to share things here, but today I have an important track to show you. It’s the first track from an upcoming concept album I’m doing as a personal project called ‘Deep’. Deep is a concept album...
October 2010
2 posts
2 tags
American Wife
Here’s something a little eclectic.
Several weeks ago I delivered one of the most interesting scoring projects I’ve had to date. Written for the moving and funny short film written and directed by Michael L. Schmidt, ‘American Wife’ represents a departure from my usual styles and therefore a great creative challenge. I was thrilled to work on the film and thoroughly...
2 tags
Dual/Duel
I recently had fun participating in a Creative Media Challenge organized by Ryerson wherein participants were given 80 hours to completely produce a media project. I worked with the same team that brought you ‘Interception’ on a film called ‘Dual/Duel’.
The score — which I had about 3 hours to write and deliver thanks to the crazy timeline of the competition — is a bad-ass...
September 2010
4 posts
2 tags
2 tags
Q & A (Original Score)
In keeping with my recent posting of the Interception score, I have recently put together a short album of music highlights from another that I scored not too long ago.
Q & A was an extremely compelling short thriller that I had the pleasure of scoring last year. It is the brainchild of director Olaf Blomerus and I highly encourage you to watch the film in its entirety here if you...
1 tag
Interception
Now that the school year is starting up again, I figured I ought to share with you a project from earlier this calendar year. “Interception” is a festival-bound short film directed by Keith Hodder, a very talented student director and schoolmate of mine. It is a very cool spy thriller and manages to be gritty without going over the top. It was a fine film to work on and I’m very...
4 tags
ComposerFocus & RyeStory
Now that I’m back from Romania, I have been gearing up for another fun winter of work, and among my developments has been a series of demos for Epic World, and Vir2 Violence (among other things).
But in addition to those, I was recently approached to write tutorial articles for a site called ComposerFocus — which I highly recommend you visit. The articles will primarily focus on teaching...
August 2010
1 post
2 tags
Romania!
I’m off to Romania!
As is my custom during the summer months, I will be returning to my homeland — cloistering myself in the mountains of Transylvania — for the next two weeks. I will be back on the 22nd, but in the meantime I’m effectively off the map. Internet access will be spotty at best, so don’t expect to be able to reach me with any consistency. I will still periodically...
July 2010
5 posts
2 tags
2 tags
BandCamp Update
So remember how I made a few of my tracks available for purchase via BandCamp not too long ago? Well it was a good test of the service and I’m quite happy with it, so I’ve decided to expand my catalogue a bit…
As of today, not only is my entire Demo Reel updated with some new tracks, but the whole thing is available for purchase on BandCamp — as an album or individually,...
1 tag
Shadow Era
For the past week and a bit, I’ve been happily working on an absolutely beautiful new iPad/iPhone/Web title called Shadow Era. You can find more information about the game itself on the website, but I wanted to share the music that’s been written for the game so far since I’m very proud of it.
The player below will be updated to include all new tracks as I complete them. A Cry...
2 tags
A Cry For War
It’s been a while since I’ve done a music post, and even though folks who keep tabs on my SoundCloud page will notice that I add things pretty consistently, I figured I’d share this one here too.
A Cry For War was written yesterday evening on a whim, and features some evocative vocal and percussion work. I’m extremely pleased with how it turned out and hope you all enjoy...
2 tags
Up and Running
Okay, sorry about that little outage back there. This is what I get for not having my domain registered and hosted in the same place. Must fix that.
Anyhow, with the site running again I thought I’d let everyone know that two short films I recently worked on are preparing to embark on the festival circuit, and I’m very proud to have been a part of both productions — they deserve all...
June 2010
5 posts
1 tag
Site Temporarily Down...
Important note to everyone: my main domain is temporarily down while I resolve some registration issues. I apologize for the spontaneous downtime and just as frustrated by it, but it is what it is.
Everything should be up and running again within three or five days. My apologies!
3 tags
From Hell
When last we spoke of gaming, it was Nier that had my attention and I was just picking up Dante’s Inferno, a relatively fresh title from EA developed by the aptly-named Visceral Games.
I expressed my interest in the game quite a while ago, largely because I am a fan of the original literature that inspired it, but also because notable game audio wonderman Garry Schyman (of Bioshock fame)...
1 tag
RSS Feed Update
Just a quick note to my RSS subscribers: I’ve had to re-make the feed because it wasn’t working properly after the transfer from the old version of the Journal. Now it’s been refreshed, has a new address, and will contain all content from the very beginning as well as properly update all the new content that comes in.
I apologize for the delayed shuffle, but at least it works...
3 tags
March of the Death Mage...And Better News!
Back again!
This time with more music and some website news. But first the interesting stuff: this piece is called March of the Death Mage and I think you’ll see why when you hear it. Enjoy the presence of pure orchestral stuff while it lasts because over the next little while I’ll be working primarily with much more modern sounds and synths. But until then:
March of the Death...
2 tags
New Music, New Experiments
After what seems like a long time with no rain, we finally had a good storm here last night, which worked out well since it gave me an excuse to stay huddled up inside and put together a new piece of music to lead the Demo Reel with.
It’s got my usual blend of orchestra and percussion, with the addition of a more prominent choir part and a cool groove. Very much enjoyed having the extra...
May 2010
2 posts
2 tags
WatchI recently had the pleasure of working with a very talented director named Olaf Blomerus on his short film debut, a little dialogue sequence called Q & A. The film recently went live on the internet, and I’m proud to show it to you now! I may post the music alone later on, but for now here is the video itself where you can hear it in context! It’s in HD, so feel free to full-screen...
3 tags
NIER, Far, Wherever You Are...
I finished playing NIER the other day.
What, you ask? The game. The one no one has really heard about because it’s been marketed by— or actually, it hasn’t really been marketed very much at all. That’s probably because it was the product of some small-time new developer, right?
Wrong. It’s made by Square Enix.
I don’t get it either, but I did get the game and I...
April 2010
3 posts
3 tags
Xylophonics
What happens when you’re restricted to just one octave of a single instrument? Well…this!
These tracks are created with nothing more than a single octave from a xylophone patch (specifically, the freebie patch from the upcoming Spitfire percussion collection), and there are no external effects or processing plugins applied to the sound. Even the reverb is just what’s built-in to...
2 tags
“Sun and moon divide the sky,
Fragrance blooms on pear wood bones:
Earth...”
– “Spring”, Deng Ming-Dao, From 365 Tao
2 tags
Music For Sale!
This has been a very busy Easter weekend for me (happy Zombie Jesus Day, by the way!) and after a whole lot of music writing, it occurred to me that I haven’t been very nice about sharing new music with you guys. In the past, when people have asked me where they can go to buy a track of mine for their listening enjoyment on the go, I’ve thus far been able to do little more than shrug...
March 2010
6 posts
2 tags
“Ambient Music must be able to accommodate many levels of listening attention...”
– Brian Eno, from the liner notes to Ambient 1: Music for Airports
3 tags
I Believe In Mary Black (Original Soundtrack)
Not too long ago I finished work on a great little short film called I Believe In Mary Black, and since the film is completed and ready to get some screenings around my area, I wanted to put together a selection of the best cues I wrote for it and assemble them into a short EP album. So I did.
The music is dark and rich, with shades of Christopher Young’s similar work for horror scores. I...
4 tags
Demo Reel Update & Milestone
Hi all!
First of all, thanks again for being such diligent listeners. It feels like just the other day I was mentioning how amazing it was that I had already gotten 1,000 plays on SoundCloud, and just now I’ve looked and the number is well over 1,500 now. I’m humbled and overjoyed. And I promise I’ll stop counting now, it just made me excited.
You’ll also notice, by the...
1 tag
Open Letter to Clients
Dear Distinguished Client,
How are you? Or, wait, first of all who are you?
You’re a budding director working on your first project. You’re an established one. You make short films. Documentaries. Blockbusters. You wear shades and walk tall.
You’re a game designer trying to put together that crucial breakout team. You have a vision. You’re starting with a mod before you...
3 tags
“Well, my good sir, to put it crudely,
You see matters just as they lie;
We...”
– Mephistopheles
from Goethe’s Faust (Trans. Walter Kaufmann)
2 tags
Journal Update
Gah, what have I done?!
Er, well I’ve basically decided that the easiest way for me to keep the Journal updated and give it a major facelift in the process is by porting it over to Tumblr. So welcome to the new place, make yourselves comfortable.
I had to manually re-publish all the old posts in order to bring them over here properly, so pardon me if your RSS feed accidentally got a bunch...
February 2010
1 post
3 tags
Orchestras and the Art of Pleasant Honking
It’s been a busy few weeks, so pardon me while I screw my head back on and regroup a bit here.
The GCFC Match-Up went exceedingly well — beyond even my wildest expectations. Working with a real orchestra, and a talented one, is an unimaginable treat, and I have to give a special thanks to Darren Fung and Victor Davies from the GCFC and Dennis Patterson from the Glenn Gould Recording Studio...
January 2010
1 post
3 tags
GCFC/CFC Match-Up
How are those New Years resolutions holding up, people?
I don’t make any, so I can’t offer you my own answer, but I can say that this has already been a year of new beginnings for me — and it’s only been half a month! After a 5 year pause, I’ve finally taken up my Kung Fu training again which is making me feel very good and physically refreshed. I did 7 years leading up...
December 2009
1 post
3 tags
Holidays!
It snowed the other day. I was half expecting this to be another soggy and ugly winter, but it seems that we may yet get a picturesque and cold — an honest and proper — winter, which I’m happy about even though I’m not a huge fan of cold weather.
The Time Traveler premiere was a lot of fun, and the private screening before it went to air was neat too….it’s interesting to...
October 2009
1 post
3 tags
Next Steps
After a long and tedious weekend of preparing stems and other such things, I can proudly say that the Time Traveler score is completed! Very exciting to see it all come together and I can’t wait to be able to share some excerpts. For now though, there’s other interesting news on the horizon…
Besides some exciting new projects coming up in the musical world, I also have some...
September 2009
1 post
3 tags
Leaps and Bounds
It’s been a fairly crazy few months in Marius land, hence the lack of updates, but I can’t leave everyone in the dark forever so here’s an idea of what I’ve been up to…
Remember that TV gig? Well, I am working hard on scoring the pilot episode as we speak. The Time Traveler (www.thetimetraveler.tv) will hit the broadcast waves sometime later this fall if all goes...
May 2009
2 posts
3 tags
Revisiting The Moonlight Path, and The Crossing
Excitement!
And lots to show as well. Before I get into showing some recent work though, I should mention that the iPhone game project I mentioned vaguely last time is indeed underway and I’m very much enjoying working on the music — it’s similar to Spitfire’s, except more developed since I have more tracks to spread the material over. In addition, I’m pursuing a potential...
2 tags
Downtime And TrackSounds.com
Hi guys,
Sorry for the site downtime over the past day and a half. My host had some issues with the server and I had to wait to be able to get it up and running again. Everything should be back and alive again now though. Still no video samples to show in the portfolio, I’m afraid, but in the meantime I wanted to share a fresh piece of music that I wrote for the demo reel the other night....
April 2009
1 post
2 tags
Astrid
So you know how every online journal author in the world is visited by the regular updates fairy? Yeah, I think mine had a run in with a jetliner on the way over or something.
Excuses aside though, the reason for my silence has, ironically, been largely caused by a profusion of new noise — music! — that I’ve been working on. In my last update, I mentioned that I was preparing to venture...
March 2009
1 post
3 tags
Jobs And All That Jazz
Jazz is fun.
I have discovered this mainly through the listening suggestions of another composer friend of mine, Robin Jessome, whose work with his jazz ensemble Blunt Object I highly encourage everyone to check out. It’s wild. It’s also inspired me to try my hand at some jazz too…if you’re interested in hearing my own entertaining pastiche on the genre, you’ll find...
February 2009
4 posts
3 tags
Dodging Bullets, Spitting Fire
Flu = 1, Marius = 2
It was a bit of a struggle, but between an good antibiotic treatment and awesome willpower, I can now happily admit to having vanquished my illness. Actually I vanquished it a week ago, but it’s been a busy intervening few days. Lots to catch up on, so here goes!
I decided recently that I was going to go down to Michigan to visit an old composer friend of mine, Nico....
3 tags
Progress and Pills
I feel like I should introduce all the new little changes and improvements to the site with some sort of abracadabrian magical utterance worthy of their coolness. But then, it occurs to me that their appearance wasn’t really magical, although it certainly seemed like it. I guess this is what I get for having a brilliant coder and a team of hard-working frogs to run this place from behind the...
3 tags
Baby Steps
It’s been just four days and look at the progress already!
The website’s skin is more or less up (though several of the coolest special features are still coming together) and it’s grown a Portfolio and Contact page! Both are fairly self-explanatory, but in case you wander over and visit the Portfolio, you will notice that as of right now it only has the one project listed in...
3 tags
Overture & Main Titles
Hello, world! Welcome to Mathazzar Studios. My name is Marius Masalar and I’m a composer for media. I’m also the owner of this place and your honoured host during your stay. As you can tell, it looks fairly skeletal around here at the moment, but behind the scenes, in the space between the internet and the screen, magical things are happening. I promise. Everything will be up and...