'The Unicorn's Horn' - New Original Music, Submission for the Splinterlands Music/Lore Contest! Electronic/Orchestral/Instrumental + Walkthrough!

Here's my submission for this week's

Splinterlans Music/Lore Contest, The Unicorn's Horn! This was a 30 Minute Songwriting Challenge, which is something I've been doing a lot lately. I like having the time limit, it forces me to just pump things out and sorta roll with them, with little editing. Overall, I dig the ideas here, though I did wind up abandoning Track 2 at the end cause it didn't work timbre-wise. I used a few Spitfire Audio instruments, the piano, and strings, along with some Ableton orchestral samples for the timpani and cymbals. Let's go through it!

Listen to The Unicorn's Horn here.

Track 1 begins the song

with a synth line that continues in the background for the rest of the tune. It winds up doing a little counterpoint with Track 4, the piano. Track 3 is an instruments from Native Instruments, a combo of two synth sounds that has an organ-y effect. Track 5 is the LABS Strings, which begin with just violas/violins, then the "cello" range comes in with the heavier drums (snare and timpani rhythm). Our last 3 tracks, 6, 7, and 8 are the timpani, cymbals, and snares, respectively.

Track 4, Piano.

Listen to The Unicorn's Horn on Soundcloud.

Track 3, NI Organ/Synth.

Listen to The Unicorn's Horn on DSound

Track 5, Strings.

The whole tune is in

Bminor, though every other time around, we begin on a Bmajor which makes it feel like a more epic, triumphant sort of resolve. There are also a few points where a Gmin/Edim are substituted for the Vi chord, which give it a darker vibe, though when it resolves to our III of Dmajor, it feels sorta happy. That back and forth between dark and light made me think of the Life Splinter, sort of epic/holy, but also violent in battle, hence the dark part.

Hope you dig this week's submission! I haven't submitted a timed challenge for the contest in a while, as I like spending some time working on a song, but I think this came out pretty cool. Maybe with a little more work it can become something even better, we will see! Support the other contestants here with some upvotes!