Editing Shroud of the Avatar Soundtrack (section)

==Praise==
:''For SotA, I have had my heart set on finding music that hearkened back to the golden age of our work on the Ultima series. For me, the music composed by Iolo and Ken Arnold remains the best music of the series. Not that we have not had great composers since… we have. But there was something compelling about the simple memorable melodies, that most modern games lose in their hugely orchestrated scores (very much like movie scores). While I hoped we could have fuller music, I hoped we could reign in the desire to go overly large, and provide players with tracks that not only felt right for the area and happenings within the game, but were also both memorable, yet not annoyingly repetitious. I knew going into it, this would be difficult.<br><br>To be honest, when we first faced the problem of musical compositions for SotA, I was lost. We got bids from a number of composition houses, that both far exceeded the budget we had available for this crowd funded game, but also, and perhaps more importantly, their demos were far from the soundscape target I was hoping to achieve in SotA. We were stuck. We tried buying music off websites that had affordable music on them, but even after enormous amounts of searching, I found little that felt right. We started down that path though because of budget reasons, never feeling quite right about it.<br><br>Then YOU, our wonderful community, stepped up. People asked why they could not submit music tracks for inclusion. My initial thoughts, and even my first response to proposals, was lukewarm at best. Early offerings from the community were far from the mark I was hoping for. While they were often great pieces of music, they generally were either too modern, too orchestral, to much like a movie score, did not sound period enough, or were well off target for some other reason. I did not believe this was going to work.<br><br>Then Holt Ironfell of the Poets Circle contacted me and asked a simple question: “Please tell us, exactly what you ARE looking for.” Only at that moment, did I realize what a disservice I had been doing the community. I quickly made copious notes to clearly articulate what I felt was, and was not, music I would hope to find for SotA. The Poets Circle (and others) then went off, formed their own councils for peer review, and raised money when needed to acquire equipment and software. Then a few short months later, the community started to submit new work.<br><br>I was literally moved to tears, to hear what amazing work this community, all of you, have been able to produce. In a few short weeks, we went from ZERO accepted pieces of work, to about 100%! While for some of the MOST complex work involving Virtues and pieces that must play together, we have had vigorous exchange to “get it right”, the VAST majority of work now done by the fine Poets Circle and many other members of the community, deserve GREAT acclaim.<br><br>By the Virtues!<br>- Lord British''<ref name="uota98">[[Richard Garriott]], [[Update of the Avatar]] #98, https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?p=45724</ref>
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:''I am overwhelmed by the creativity and quality of music created for Shroud of the Avatar by YOU, our amazing community!<br>- Lord British''<ref name="uota99">[[Richard Garriott]], [[Update of the Avatar]] #99, https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?p=45843</ref>
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:''We would again love to celebrate the quality and diversity of music being created by the wonderful composers within our community. I believe we are ending up with one of the strongest soundtracks ever created for a game world.<br>- Lord British''<ref name="uota101">[[Richard Garriott]], [[Update of the Avatar]] #101, https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?p=46224</ref>