My personal favorite song, of those created by me, this one fully recorded, imagined, mixed and (barely) mastered by me. I was asked to record and mix a song, with the thematic side of things largely up to me. I chose to take a classical waltz and try to fuse some jazzy touches into it.

The main melody is taken from Dmitri Shostakovich’s Waltz No. 2, but the rest of the backing, rhythm and drum tracks, as well as the ad-lib sections and finishing touches, are all my creations, arranged to fit the jazz-esque concept. I played the drums on this one and recorded multiple people playing the other instruments, besides the keys, which are designed via a VST plugin. The saxophone was an especially interesting session to lead.

The first track’s the original mix, finished circa late 2016, as I initially imagined it. The second one’s a more recent mix (a Late Nite VIP Mix, if you will), as I decided to do a re-master of sorts. This was partially due to having obtained better software and mixing skills over time in general, as well as for experimental purposes, to see how I would mix it years later, without having listened to the old version in a while.

Listen to both of ‘ em, see which one you prefer and how I might have improved over the years, in this particular area of audio at least.