Regarding the tracks, when Mr. Miyamoto mailed me my copy of the game, his personal note said that they chose the tracklist on the following rough guidelines:

"RE: the tracklist.

• Axiom A: Whereas it is an international release with everyone receiving exactly the same songs, the tracks needs to cover a lot of ground and include differing regional flavors.
• Axiom B: Whereas the decision was made not to display a scores or guide by default while playing the songs, they need to be relatively simple and recognizable melodies. Addendum: Combining this with Axiom A, it is clear that effort must be made to choose songs that are recognizable around the world, as much as possible.
• Axiom C: Being a game that attempts, first and foremost, to foster creativity with music, there need to be a good number of very simple tracks to get the player started, and on which the player will feel more comfortable experimenting.
• Axiom D: Whereas encouraging a more classical flavor of musical education is important to the game in its differentiation from other rhythm games on the market, some famous composers and pieces will be featured.

So, the consequence is that we numbered it down to the following sections of the tracklist:

• 1. Extremely simple and recognizable songs, pursuant to Ax. C.
• 2. Famous classical works, pursuant to Ax. D.
• 3. Folk tunes from around the world, including ones originating in the US, Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, and more. See Ax. A.
• 4. Pop tunes, but only ones that made it into the top of the charts worldwide and that nearly anyone is likely to recognize (eg. Material Girl). See Ax. B, Addendum.
• 5. Nintendo tunes, which require no justification.

So, meeting all those requirements was tough, and the classic Nintendo tunes, while present, were not the only thing to factor in while producing the tracklist."

This is the word of Miyamoto for the people of Miyamoto.

I know. I just meant I wish they had put more songs, and that those extra songs would have been from Nintendo games. I have zero interest in the majority of the songs. Fortunately, I finally got Mute City (third Nintendo song... yay), which should entertain me for a good while.

Just remember that unlike most other "music games," you can play each song in this game a thousand different ways, including many rearrangements that are in the same key, but otherwise share no similarities with the song you selected. Once you get a hang of that, the limited track list won't impede you at all. If you want more songs...you can make them yourself.

I think if you play around with it long enough, though, you'll find that many songs which might otherwise not interest you can be very useful for bending into your own creations. You wouldn't find me just listening to Frere' Jacques (unless I'm reminiscing about an awkward television scene with Jean-Luc Picard), but I've had great fun taking the structure of that song and trying other things with it.

But each to his own, of course. You certainly don't have to take Shigeru's explanation at face value, they might have just gotten lazy at the end. Besides, he drew a crude picture of a chain chomp on the back of the note, and circled the chain, so... he might just be pulling my leg.

EDIT: What Chicken said.

I had been trying to do that for awhile but it was difficult because I could hear the original song being played already. Just realized you can eliminate instruments before entering a jam. Doh.

It's an awkward way to go about creating music, but I shall give it a shot.

It is a very unusual process, and not easy to get the hang of, but it can turn out quite well on occasion. It's best of course not to completely ignore the original song, but to be aware of where you are in the original progression, so that you know what you'll be getting when you, for instance, play a chord or hold out a note. Then again, I only pretend to be an expert.

Let the master show you how it's done.

Well you should get it because it has along of songs that everyone knows in it. Over 50 instruments you can play as.

So I'm really getting into this now that I know how to silence the stupid Tutes, haha. I've got a couple Hawaiian-ish covers of Mute City and Super Mario Brothers that I'm having fun with. My favorite line-up so far is: Harp (bass), Maracas, Congas, Ukulele, Trumpet, Trumpet.

I'm really horrible at the timing unfortunately because waggle controls aren't that responsive and hurt my wrist when done too much (plus, I have bad timing to begin with, oy vey), but I don't go into this with expectations of a professional product, so I'm mostly satisfied.

I hate to be a party pooper, but I'd really rather it with button controls. Too many times I move the controller and it doesn't make the note or it makes two notes instead of one. I don't think it's me (I know how to move my arm, been doing it a couple years now), but maybe it is. Not a major complaint, and it's probably a personal thing due to a somewhat fragile right wrist.

I like two do two leads on trumpet and usually end up with some really cool stuff mixed in with some really discordant stuff... but I'll just call it jazz and not worry about it. Sounds like a plan to me.

I might have to pick up this little gem now that I've spent some more time with it. I hope I can find it somewhere cheap. For awhile now I've been begging a couple trumpet-playing friends of mine to do some music like this, but I'll have to settle for my Mii clone army.

Did I say settle? I meant to say: Sweet, a Mii clone army band!

P.S. Is there a way to make the song longer? While I wasn't expecting to make 10+ minute epics with multiple movements, I was hoping for a bit more than a minute at least.

I haven't had that much trouble with the timing, but it did take some adjustment. Which instruments give you more trouble? For guitar-like instruments, I've found that it really does help to hold the remote horizontally and move it as if you're hitting the string on each downstroke at the point of perfect parallel to the floor, and for faster pickin', you of course have to learn to use it with the down arrow to enable double-picking, but that's even trickier at first. Make sure to check all the advanced controls for each instrument in the mode where you can try each one out -- the nunchuck button that switches between single notes and chords on guitar instruments, for instance, is crucial, as is the parallel switching function performed by pushing up on the stick when using string instruments.

Anyhow, on the song length question -- you are always free to take the song down to the lowest tempo using the slider, then just play your measures in double time. I tend to like the shorter songs, since there's less distance to work out, and I can just effect a couple quick changes in textures or crescendos and then wrap up. Then again, that also likely has to do with the fact that I regard the 2 - 3 minute Beatles song as the perfection of pop musical arrangement.

I'm still figuring out what buttons do what for each instrument. I'm sure they're explained in the instrument jam mode, but I never bothered with that yet.

I've tried holding the remote every which way, and it is just a bit finicky sometimes. Not bad enough to care though. I'm enjoying it regardless.

I have been playing slower tempo already, but I hadn't thought of speeding it up manually that way. That's certainly an idea. I prefer long, slow songs myself, but if I had to pick between a short slow song or a long fast song, hmm... I'll have to give it a shot, I guess.

Thanks for the tips, by the way. A lot of this (particularly the tempo thing) I seem to remember from earlier in the thread now, but the thread is too long to look back through and I forget quickly.

I'm putting the game aside for the night, but I do have one more question: Can you control if you hit with an upstroke or downstroke on string instruments? I seem to hit with all downstrokes, which doesn't really sound that great.

You mean fretless string instruments? On those of course you don't really use hits per se, but you just keep moving the remote back and forth like a bow, the speed of which controls your volume, while the nunchuck buttons alone switch your note, so that you can certainly keep moving the bow up and down on the same note for as long as you want, or you can hold a button on the nunchuck even before you start bowing, so that you have less "attack" on the notes.

But you're likely asking about the fretted ones (well, and the string bass I suppose), where only downstrokes will register by default, and you have to hold the down arrow on the remote in order to enable double-picking, but that is certainly challenging at first, and I've only been able to get it right by holding the remote perfectly horizontal and moving up and down; it's something you have to just play with I guess.

Not sure if I answered your question or not, but that's what's I got's.

Glad you're enjoying it, A-Dawggie. One thing I would change about the game (if I had my wishes...) is the ability to double or triple the song's length. Just have it loop a few times, is all (and save the big finish for...uhm...the big finish), which would give you a lot more room to improvise. Often I'll find myself fighting at the end of the song to pinch it off, because it ended JUST as I started to enjoy the jam. But, hey, it's alright. I'm with you...give me a 12-minute loose jam any day. I'll have to ask Iwata about it when he stops by the house.

Also, I'd love to hear some of your stuff. I use the ukulele a lot (it slots in beautifully beside the piano and guitar instruments) but not so much your other instruments of choice. Oh, and now that you have Wii Music, you can hear my Sigur-Ros-inspired nonsense which sucks!! When do you return the game?

Oh, and regarding the motion control not registering...I don't have trouble with it now, but I DO remember having to get used to it. Assuming your Wiimote is in good working order, just pick an instrument and do the instrument jam (whatever that option is called where you pick any instrument and the tutes arrive one by one to play behind you), and get the hang of how to get your motions to register. It's not hard, per se, but maybe you'll be able to figure out why it sometimes registers and sometimes doesn't.

I really need to do those lessons and the conducting stuff. I haven't unlocked any new songs in ages; still only the one nintendo game song. Now that I've finished my first playthrough of Fire Emblem I should be able to get on with other games!

By the way, Adam -- I noticed that you were already confirmed as a Wii contact for me last night, but this morning Wii Music still did not recognize it (it lets you know as soon as you enter the game's main menu) -- so, it usually does take a little longer for Wii Music to confirm even after contacts are confirmed on the main Wii menu, but if you notice that no one has been confirmed for video sharing yet, you might want to check and make certain you have Wii Connect 24 enabled in the Wii system options, since that is required for the game to share videos (as Chicken proved, however, the setting alone would seem to be enough; even if your Wii is disconnected from the internet regularly, it still allows videos to be downloaded the next time you come online).

@ Wario
Fretted instruments is what I was talking about, thanks. The ukulele really needs a mix of up and down strokes to sound right. Also, I just turned on Video Sharing. I had assumed (and consequently made an ass out of u and me) that it was on by default. Fixed.

@ Chicken
I agree, we need 12-minute jams. I hope he visits soon. I have to return it Sunday by noon. If I continue to enjoy it I might pick it up, but I've got so many games to look forward to this year that I'm not sure I should. But I'd love to hear how you could possibly squeeze a Sigur Ros-esque song into one or two minutes.

to Adam, at last are you planning to buy Wii Music?

P.s. Fire Emblem? great game, my favorite one is Path of Radiance for GameCube

I will if I find it cheap. If I have to pay full price, it's iffy. I'll see how I feel about it come Sunday.

As a fortunate consequence of the game's unfortunately low sales, you probably can pick it up pretty cheap if you keep on the lookout.

I don't think retail dropped at all (I read somewhere that Nintendo is hugely reluctant to drop their prices) but I've seen a few second-hand copies at GameStop and the like.

I'll add Adam and Terra tonight and send some vids. I'll also post here, Adam, letting you know what I tried to do with each video, so you can explain to me exactly how I failed.