Honestly would love to see you go in a completely different orchestral direction with something more slow and less percussive.

Holy moly that orchestration is insane :o

I like the dark atmosphere at the beginning and the dramatic orchestral/vocal hits at :25. The vocals at 1:04 are absolutely haunting, and you’ve certainly done an excellent job with the pacing here. The triumphant mood at 1:34 is thrilling, and I love how you implement the orchestral hits into the energetic Celtic melodies at 2:15. The bass slide at 2:28 (and again at 2:45) were nice touches as well. And you slide seamlessly into another beautiful, captivating atmosphere at 2:52. The bridge at 3:48 with the horn stabs had another strong progression with some excellent phrasing. The percussion during that section sounds a bit bottom-heavy and unnatural somehow. Also, the vocals seem to be “washing back” in the mix a bit at around 4:25, such that the body of the sound is just slightly behind the beat - and the same thing may be happening to the strings at 1:55, but it’s hard to tell with so much going on in the texture. Otherwise, the mixing here is really strong, though. The final climax at 5:25 totally earned its title, although you may have overused the bass slides a tad by the end. Overall, all of my complaints are tiny details. The progression of the piece is probably my favorite part. Seriously, let me call up George Lucas and ask him to make a movie based on this piece. :D Keep it up, Elias!

Mixing, mastering, and balance
2/2
Structure, transitions, phrasing, and variety
1.5/1.5
Melody, tonality, harmony, and texture
2/2
Instrumentation and sound design
1/1
Emotion, atmosphere, and catchiness
1.5/1.5
Originality and uniqueness
1/1
Overall (how do the elements above interact?)
.75/1
Composite score
9.75/10

woah!

Extremely powerful :)
Congrats on 2nd place! Well deserved