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[Tejas Shroff]

Hey guys! You might remember me from a few TIG Music Challenges or simply hanging out in the forums!

For the past few months, I’ve been working on a way to give musical feedback to composers who are open to improving their compositional skills. I got the idea a few years ago, when I myself struggled to improve my musical theory, technique, etc., and was looking for a way to bring in an extra set of ears to hear my music without always bothering friends and family.

Now that I know a lot more about music composition on all fronts, I thought I’d share my knowledge by giving feedback to others, and created MusikTrack.

MusikTrack is a way for composers to get on track by receiving feedback on their original music, and then moving forward from the critiques/suggestions they get. Its made to be super easy, but it is in its alpha stage, and needs some more testers!

If you would like to try it out, follow the link below to the main site. From there, feel free to navigate through the site, or even see how the feedback process works by submitting/linking an original piece of music!

A major inspiration for MusikTrack were the feedback posts/threads here in the Audio sub-forum – I really wanted to mimic that with MusikTrack, but still flesh it out to make a place where composers can learn and grow as well.

Please don’t take this post as a push to use MusikTrack – heck, I’m not even selling anything! – but I would love if you would check the site out and give me some feedback (can you smell the irony? ).

Link: http://www.musiktrack.com – Enjoy and tell me what you think!

Cheers, and feel free to ask any questions!

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UPDATE: 9/1/14

Welcome back!

Its been an interesting week filled with some struggles and hishaps, but I've managed to learn much about what I want MusikTrack to be and how I can make it get there.

The most important thing I've learned is that in order to extend the functionality of MusikTrack, I would have to switch content management systems (CMS). I currently use WordPress, but I am looking to move to Joomla for better stability and less loopholes!

That said, I am going to close MusikTrack for a while as I 1). make the transition to a new CMS, and 2). work to make MusikTrack even better than it is.

As always, I am very much open to comments/suggestions!

*Hiatus starts now*

-The MusikTrack Team

[Daniel Pellicer]

A couple of things I found while registering and submiting a song:

1.- When registering: "As you can see by the form on your left" The form is actually on my right :p. I suppose you changed the layout and thats why it sounds missplaced

2.- When I registered I received an email with the password in plain text. This is usually not a good practice. http://plaintextoffenders.com/faq/devs

3.- When I got to submit a track, I found that the box for writing about the music is a little bit small.

4.- If I want to submit the song there are three buttons. Submit, reset and continue. I didn't try reset but when pushing continue an about page of wordpress came and the submission was not done. Then I went back, I pressed continue and it worked correctly


Also, I have a question: Are you going to review every track someone submits directly yourself? What if it becomes super famous and thousands of people submit their tracks? You could be a little overwhelmed.



I have to add that I found the webpage very beautiful, smooth and intuitive.

[Tejas Shroff]

Hey Daniel!

Thanks so much for trying it out! And really, thanks for the comments!...yeah I meant to say the form was on your other left

I am currently working on a brand new system of e-mailing users - as you probably saw, the current way is a bit insecure and not very visually appealing!

I'll also stretch out the written form box on the feedback page, and maybe re-think how the feedback page is configured. Right now, people can click continue without submitting their music, and sometimes the page can redirect into a blackhole which is why you might have suddenly jumped to a non-existent about page

Currently I am reviewing each submission individually, but thats why I say 'you will get your feedback in aprox. 3 days' (to create some leeway in case of a large number of feedback responses).

And thanks so much about your comment about the visuals of the website - although it is built on a base Wordpress theme, I designed/coded all the nuances myself so it looks as simple and elegant without hurting the website loading times!

Thanks again for your comments and reply!

[flamestalker]

So are you eventually going to open up feedback so that everyone can see other people's work publicly and leave comments as they wish? I submitted one of mine as well. Cool idea!

[Tejas Shroff]

flamestalker,

Right now, feedback only goes to the respective composer. Since music is pretty personal, I try to keep the process as private as possible, so there is technically only an interaction between the MusikTrack team and the composer who wants feedback. As for branching out to the public - I am definitely working on a feedback environment that also involves the community - its just not ready to launch yet .

BTW, thanks so much for submitting your music! Look for feedback in your profile inbox by the end of today!

[PythonBlue]

Certainly a nice idea, but I do have a question: will this be just for game music, or are other genres permitted? I personally wouldn't mind if only soundtracks are permitted, since they often encompass other genres, but I'm still curious.

EDIT: NVM, the site seems to be multi-genre in audience. Still a great idea.

[WittyNotes]

I very much like this idea, Tejas: signed up and submitted. I've been a user of online critiquing circles for things like creative writing for a while, and it always bothered me that there wasn't something similar for music.

Here's hoping this really takes off!

[WittyNotes]

Hey Tejas, I just have a question about the site: I uploaded my music, but I was expecting that I'd need to provide feedback before I 'earned' the right to submit a piece for feedback. Now that I've submitted, I'm a little confused: who exactly is going to be giving feedback on my music? Will I have an opportunity to give feedback to others?

[Tejas Shroff]

Hey all,

I've been quite busy with back-end optimization and reworking the feedback page, so I'm sorry if I left a few questions hanging regarding MusikTrack.

Certainly a nice idea, but I do have a question: will this be just for game music, or are other genres permitted?

PythonBlue,

Thanks for joining this thread, as I've been an avid fan of your work on Amnesia! Right now, I'm concentrating solely on instrumental/any kind of soundtrack music since that's my area of expertise . Lyrical music is a bit different since in most cases, the instrumentation is more of a compliment to the lyrics, making it harder to critique especially when thats not your cup of tea.

Hey Tejas, I just have a question about the site: I uploaded my music, but I was expecting that I'd need to provide feedback before I 'earned' the right to submit a piece for feedback. Now that I've submitted, I'm a little confused: who exactly is going to be giving feedback on my music? Will I have an opportunity to give feedback to others?

Hey WittyNotes,

Thanks for your earlier comments regarding the MusikTrack concept! When building MusikTrack back in May, I had all sorts of ideas of how users can interact with others to provide a sense of 'community feedback', and how I can create an environment where online music education is easily accessible. However, I saw that I was deviating from my main purpose to provide quick, valuable feedback for composers who want to improve themselves (and plus, then the site wouldn't be much different than the many feedback threads on this forum ).

That why I currently have a very simply way of composers to get feedback - sign in, select your music, hit submit. To answer your question, after a composer submits their music, the MusikTrack team (currently only me ) will provide feedback to your music. I understand there is a barrier of credibility since MusikTrack itself is only a few weeks old, but let me know if your thoughts about this change once you get your feedback. I've composed and been in this industry for close to 8 years now, and I feel that I am at a level to share by knowledge and skill with other composers.

That said, remember that I've launched MusikTrack in alpha mode, and I have a lot more planned in the future regarding how composers learn and grow through feedback and through interactive learning. So stay tuned, and please let me know if you have any ideas regarding how MusikTrack should work - I'm very open to community response !

BTW: How do you like the feedback page? Not sure if you saw it a few days ago, but it is a little more confusing then. In your experience, was it simple to use/fast to load? Let me know your thoughts so I can tweak accordingly!

Cheers!

[PythonBlue]

Glad to hear I've made that much of an impression! In all fairness, however, I only did music for a mod of the game, even if a popular one. XD

As for the main topic, while a lot of my work is not meant as soundtrack work, rest assured, even most of my non-soundtrack work is instrumental. Only one original piece I wrote even has lyrics, and that was fairly recently. XD

Yeah, I guess I'll find the time to register soon, then.

[Daniel Pellicer]

I got my review! is super cool!  (we need a guy playing piano or something like that as smiley)

[Tejas Shroff]

I got my review! is super cool!  (we need a guy playing piano or something like that as smiley)

Thanks Daniel! Really helps to spread the word!

Sorry all if I've been silent for the past week. I've managed to reconfigure how uploads/links are submitted, and got a manageable email system  up and running! And thanks to everyone who has waited patiently for their feedback review - I'm really sorry if the wait was a little heavier than anticipated (a few sleepless nights fixing bugs doesn't help ).

Everyone who has submitted music should be getting theirs very soon, unless they've already got it! Looking forward to see how MusikTrack can help you guys, and hearing what changes I need to implement to make MusikTrack even better !

-Tejas

[WittyNotes]

Hey there, Tejas,

Just one feature/bug I'm wondering about: I could've sworn that I submitted a piece when I signed up, but I don't see any indication that I've got a piece 'in the queue' or 'awaiting feedback' or anything. Can I safely assume that the piece didn't go through and I should resubmit?
Thanks again for organizing all this.
- Evan

[ZackParrish]

I'd be willing to help you out with the feedback, sir. Depending on the language your are coding your site with I might be able to help you there as well(I do ASP.NET, Visual Basic, SQL Server, HTML, CSS, blah blah blah...)

[Tejas Shroff]

@WittyNotes: Just sent out your review ! Hope you enjoy and let me know your thoughts/how you liked it!

@ZackParrish: Thanks so much for reaching out! Just sent you a PM!

[Tejas Shroff]

Hey all,

After countless hours spent on building the MusikTrack idea and site, as well as writing a swell of reviews, I finally feel I have proven the MusikTrack concept of helping the budding composer through providing genuine feedback and external resources.

Thanks to the many who have submitted their music, and for your comments on how the feedback made a true difference in approaching your next music composition. MusikTrack has only been active for less than two weeks and the response has been enormous!

For the next week, I am going to temporarily hibernate the site in order to do some severe coding and updates that add new features and create MusikTrack as a more established entry in the music industry. Although my feedback reviews have been totally free, I have (from the start) developed MusikTrack under a business infrastructure to both enable its purpose and service to offer a unique value proposition to composers.

However, have no fear, I'm not going to go on a rampage by implementing a bunch of in-app purchases , but I am ready to establish MusikTrack as a premium service that does not break peoples wallets (remember, I am a composer too ). That said, I will not take any more submissions via the site/e-mail to ensure my full focus on rebuilding the brand and business.

Although MusikTrack will be down for the next week, I will be on these forums daily to answer any question anyone has, or to clarify anything I've said. I will also copy this message to the OP, just to make sure anyone who reads this thread also knows whats going on without scrolling through a page of posts!

Cheers,

-Tejas

[Tejas Shroff]

Welcome back!

Its been an interesting week filled with some struggles and hishaps, but I've managed to learn much about what I want MusikTrack to be and how I can make it get there.

The most important thing I've learned is that in order to extend the functionality of MusikTrack, I would have to switch content management systems (CMS). I currently use WordPress, but I am looking to move to Joomla for better stability and less loopholes!

That said, I am going to close MusikTrack for a while as I 1). make the transition to a new CMS, and 2). work to make MusikTrack even better than it is.

As always, I am very much open to comments/suggestions!

*Hiatus starts now*

-The MusikTrack Team