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Good afternoon everyone! It's been a while since I've posted, so I thought I would come back with something fairly simple. A little while back I entered a small online composition contest. I was tasked with writing a 90 second piece of music to describe an image (pictured below). Sadly, I was not selected as a finalist... (hence the thread title lol) So I thought I would post my entry here for some feedback. There are two main themes I tried to develop, first in the trumpet at 0:04, and the second in the strings at 0:09. I only had 90 seconds, but I managed to make it into a quick ABA form. A couple of questions for feedback: What was your favorite part? Least favorite part? Do you feel the piece describes the image? Any critiques of technique, e.g. harmony, melody writing, counterpoint, orchestration, voice-leading, etc.? Do you have any comments of the quality of the performance in the audio file? I really want this to be a decent representation of how the piece would sound if it were performed live, since it is unlikely it ever will be. Feel free to put your "conductor hat" on and critique the "orchestra". Any critiques of the presentation of the score? Or the score video? Are there any composers this reminds you of, that I might enjoy listening to? Sound libraries: All winds and strings are VSL Synchron, all percussion is Spitfire Percussion. Score video: The image: Score: Competition Score - Transposed Score gmm.pdf

Nice! Mind your cello range - the cellos can't play below the low C below the staff in bass clef. So your last note for the cello would just have to be an octave higher. I'm once again confused by your choice of instruments. You clearly intended to make this for a string quartet, but now you're using the ensemble patches for the strings. Just confused about that. Your harmonic choices are becoming more adventurous. But you still lack a long leading melodic line which would really help guide your music towards a goal oriented musical journey and development. I was surprised by the G minor chords in meas. 12 & 23. You're improving!

Hey, good to hear some music from you again! I'm curious if you'll develop this more, since it ends right where I felt like it was just getting started. To me, it would be a waste of an awesome idea, so maybe at some point you'll grace the forums with an extended version. Overall I think you did a great job depicting the picture, it felt like entering a new town in an RPG type of game. I like your development of themes, especially the second theme in the strings serving as a counter melody or harmony to the first theme, then it getting it's own room to shine in the B section. Orchestration is wonderful as always, but the winds felt a bit buried at times. I know a lot of it was for effect and color, but it was hard to hear sometimes when you gave them the themes to play. Just a thought, could be the rendering, I dunno. I always like the score videos, but it was kinda hard to read. Maybe have a score showing only the parts playing? I always dig the pdf too. Anyway, glad you're around again, I'm always a fan of your music! - #1 gmm fanboi

excellent, just excellent! Hearing your score felt like it was 8 minutes not 3 shows how into your score I was