JWNewton

I'm a bit late to the party, but I can never resist this conversation. I'll preface my opinions by saying that I have pop music on in the background as I'm writing this. I would choose to listen to classical music over pop music 99% of the time. This is for a number of reasons, some of which have already been said. I think that the melodies in tonal classical music are far more interesting than those in pop music. They are more creatively written, scaffolded by what I find to be far superior harmony and counterpoint. Listen to any Rachmaninoff piano prelude (23/4 and 23/10 are gems among gems for counterpoint) or just any short classical piece and it's plain that classical music accomplishes more in the same amount of time as a pop song's length. On the other end of length, when I've had this conversation (classical v. pop) with my friends, one of their biggest gripes is how long-winded classical music is. That a symphony can be longer than an hour long seems to be an utterly foreign idea--"Surely you get bored listening to anything for that long!" Actually, not really. I find that the tendency of classical music to be longer than pop music allows for so much more possibility and variety that a skilled composer can manipulate so well that I listen engaged for the entire hour-long symphony. Thematic development, something pop music lacks the time to execute thoroughly, is necessary to a good piece. But even where pop music could have some degree of thematic development, we still get to hear the same identical chorus three times. I recently discovered Liszt's Harmonies poetiques et religieuses. What he does with the melodic material of the Benediction de Dieu dans la solitude for 18 minutes is amazing. Each time the A theme returns, it's different. This is rarely the case in pop music. I think the harmonies in classical music are more engaging than those in pop music. To say nothing of the typical four-chord progression, I find the other harmonic elements to be very boring. Someone said something about how a good songwriter must have a skilled grasp of voice-leading. While one would assume that to be the case, I find that in practice, there is little proper voice-leading in pop music. The harmony, it seems, nearly always consists of a whole bunch of parallel fifths. Disregarding voice-leading errors, this means that harmonic devices as simple as chord inversions are few and far between. Even Classical period harmony is more interesting than that. Classical music is more performance-focused. This is kind of out there, but I wanted to give more reasoning than just pure musical content since that's what's been happening elsewhere in the thread. Have you ever listened to a good pop song and then googled it to find that the singer isn't a performer? Maybe that's something that just drives me crazy? Or if there is a performance, it seems that it's always performed in a key in a more comfortable range. I'm not talking about all of the pop musicians who tour and give live performances and want to make that clear. It seems that there are more and more pop musicians who only make studio recordings and rely on autotune and editing magic to make a good song. Can you imagine if Lugansky or Argerich or some orchestra used editing to fix the wrong notes in their recordings? Scandal would ensue. In the classical world, it's always been perform first, and then record second [if you are famous enough that people will actually listen to your recording, haha], and I think that standard helps ensure quality. In the pop world, it's the other way around and so anyone who wants to can make a simple pop record. I for one vastly prefer a live concert, whether classical or pop, to a recording. I'll refrain from commenting more on this. I tried to avoid the elusive conclusion that pop or classical is better than the other and just discuss why I prefer classical music. Hopefully I was marginally successful. Lastly, yes--I think it is ridiculous that people are criticizing that author for his passion for classical music. Besides acknowledging that people are entitled to their own opinions and that there is nothing remotely harmful about shouting from the rooftops about how much one likes classical music, it all just comes down to personal taste. I've been glorifying classical music, but I like pop and rock and all of the others too (just not as much, haha).

Charles, Thank you for your kind words and in-depth comments! The second movement of Shostakovich's 2nd concerto is one of my all-time favorites, so for you to say that this piece had a similar impact on you means a great deal. The marcato in m.146 has actually been edited out (it jumps from m.144 to 157 now), which helps emphasize the Molto maestoso con fuoco more. Since making the original post, I have composed an alternative ending that I have mixed feelings about. It is more of a "furious Chopin-esque coda" (though I'd call it more Lisztian), but it has less emotional impact. I'll attach the edited score and another sight-reading recording on the original post in case you're interested in hearing that and the other edits I've made. The m.188 line is actually not a glissando. I was indicating that the left hand jumps down to the Db octave. Like with Henry, I really appreciated the Chopin-esque context that you made these comments in. I mentioned York Bowen when replying to him, and I think you would enjoy his music too. It's like Rachmaninoff + Chopin + British + ...something like Gershwin. He's one of the finest post-Romantic composers, in my opinion, and the pianism of his writing is third only to Chopin and Liszt (sometimes even better than Liszt, I think). It's baffling to me that his music is so rarely heard. His ballades were another source of inspiration for this piece. If you want to explore his music, his ballades, Toccata op.155, and 24 Preludes are great pieces to start with. Thanks again for your thorough comments!

Henry, Thank you so much for your detailed comments! I appreciated the Chopinistic context of your comments. Have you ever listened to York Bowen's ballades, or his other piano music? It's absolutely fantastic. I was also inspired by Bowen's ballades to an extent. If you want to check his music out, Joop Celis has it all recorded. The ballades, Toccata op. 155, and 24 Preludes are great jumping-off points for getting into his music. Thanks for telling me how you feel about the dramatic pacing. I'll take that into consideration when composing similar music in the future. Again, thanks for taking the time to write a detailed review!

Well put. One of my relatives has a master’s degree in music composition (she’s been my main mentor). We’ve talked about this piece before, but she had some ideas about the end. (I asked what everyone thought about the end because I wasn’t quite satisfied.) Anyway, the end was shrunk down a bit, and I think it’s more effective now. This is definitely one of my favorite parts too. For a while, I’ve been working on composing a full-length symphony (as opposed to tone poems and the like), and an orchestration of Ballade will likely function as the first movement. And of course, the orchestra would be able to deliver this climax very well. It’s interesting that you point this out though. Before you made this comment, I came to the same conclusion and actually cut this part out. Now, there’s a buildup to a climax that never comes, which makes the subsequent real climax more effective. High compliments! I’m very glad that you enjoyed listening, especially to music that isn’t your preferred style! Thanks for the recommendation; I may perform this myself or show it to other pianist friends, but I figure I’m competent enough a pianist (if I practice, haha) to not need to hire a recording. I’ll definitely check out your Poetic Pieces though! It’s always nice to hear a live recording. Thanks for your comments! Jacob

You know your ensemble much better than I do, so I'll defer to your judgment there. I do agree with you though; the irregular meter is certainly not out of place at all, and will be easier to learn than truly random meter changes. I'm glad! Have you tried writing for solo piano? I found that experimenting with piano textures prepared me well to compose for ensembles where texture is more delicate. Yeah, I wouldn't count on hearing them. Absolutely go for that. Bassists love fun parts. I don't know if you're planning to rework anything, but a bass solo would be sort of fun! I'm really glad that you found my comments useful and that they weren't unfairly blunt. You have an awesome perspective on your music, and I think that you'll go far with that. Ha! Believe me, I get that 😂 That makes a lot more sense now. Hey, also: I don't give feedback quid pro quo, but since you offered...I've got a piece on here called Ballade in F-minor that I'm looking to submit to a competition, so if you want to give that a look, I'd be very grateful.

Really well done! The energy was very striking and very enjoyable throughout. My practical experience with wind instruments extends only to thrift store purchases that I have little knowledge of how to play, but I'll do my best to give relevant feedback. Some of my comments have already been brought up, but I'll repeat them anyway. First of all, the time signatures are probably too much. The irregular meter is one of my favorite character elements, but for college musicians (unless you're at Curtis or something), this is most likely impossible. Even pieces notorious for abundant metric changes are difficult for professionals. The musicians will surely try their best, but this may end up sounding like a mess. The parts you've written are very involved, and that isn't a bad thing. But keep in mind that musicians get tired. As others have pointed out, make sure you have plentiful places of breath. I'd add an encouragement to compose more extended breaks so that the players have a chance to be relieved from the constant pressure. The perpetual motion in the piece Though this piece is very rhythmic in nature, I think it could benefit from more harmonic interest. Oftentimes you have some given tonality repeated for very extended periods. Understand that I was never bored by this, but I would be more engaged by more interesting harmony or more varied tonality. I wouldn't call this a problem to fix; more just something to improve. In terms of readability, I will admit that your dynamics confused me. For instance, sextuple-forte (fortissississississimo?) is all but impossible to achieve. In places like the final measure, where you've marked a crescendo from quadruple-forte to sextuple-forte, the intended differences become negligible, even nonexistent. You've used this marking in many, many places throughout the piece. It might sound crazy, but try being more conservative in your dynamic usage. Instead of experimenting with how many fortes you can add before it stops getting louder, try the much simpler marking possibile. As a musician, it's often easier to know what the composer is saying when I see ff possibile (or even fff possibile) than when I see 500 f's. Perhaps there's a time and a place for sextuple-forte (Albéniz marked a fffff in Fête-Dieu à Séville), but such markings are better reserved for hyperbolically indicating, in the extreme-est cases, the single greatest climax of a piece rather than copiously marking higher than fortissimo. The texture seems constantly full; not necessarily full tutti the whole time, but nearly always full. This matters for three reasons. First, such textures begin to wane in interest quite quickly if used too extensively. Second, it reduces the scale of dynamic contrasts. Have you ever wondered why tutti passages are nearly always loud or even the climax of a piece? I used to. And then, I realized that with so many instruments playing at the same time, having an ensemble play quietly is very difficult (I'll talk more about this later) and my orchestration since has been all the better for that. I now employ tutti very hesitantly (probably too hesitantly, to be frank), preferring to operate in more transparent textures. In the places where you mark quiet dynamics (I saw pianississimo and niente), a full texture will not help you out. Especially with the niente. Incidentally, in the places where you've marked diminuendo al niente, it's really wasteful of this niche marking to have other instruments come in before the effect ends. Just do diminuendo to piano or just plain diminuendo. I'd maybe even argue that you don't employ niente at all, as it doesn't fit the energy of the piece (in my opinion). I mentioned transparent textures earlier. That brings me to number three: full textures reduce the color of an ensemble. I'm sure you're very familiar with the different timbres in a wind ensemble. When you have a lot of different timbres at the same time, the color of each diminishes exponentially. To produce more variance, consider thinning out the texture more (which will also help you in achieving quieter dynamics). I'm the organist for my church, and one of the first things I learned when I started playing the organ was that there's a point where adding more stops changes literally nothing: not dynamic, not color. The same can be said for an ensemble. With what I was saying before, full textures are even more difficult to make quiet when the ensemble in question is composed of wind, brass, and percussion: the loudest instruments of all! Related, be careful with the double bass. It's neither a loud nor particularly penetrating instrument, especially compared to the other instruments in the ensemble. I don't know how many bassists are in your ensemble, but even a large group of them will probably fail to be heard in your texture. If it's just one player...well, they really might as well not play anything. That concludes my feedback! Even though I focused on the things I think could be better, I want you to know that I really enjoyed listening to this movement. You did a lot of things very well! I'm excited to hear about the live performance this spring, and even more excited to see the work that you put on here in the future! Best, Jacob

That isn't true. You are an excellent composer. I definitely think it's more for this reason that I'm struggling a bit. Make no mistake: this piece is wonderful, and even I, someone completely inexperienced with the sort of harmony you employ here, can tell that. But I'm very limited in my ability to understand it, and so struggle to engage with it.

I’m glad at least some of this was helpful! 😅 No, the fast passage has nothing to do with interpretation. There’s more interpretation in chords than fast notes, I think. But I really phrased that horribly. There’s plenty of opportunity for interpretation in this concerto, but I think there could be more. Pēteris Vasks’ Cello Concerto “PRESENCE” (2015) is one of my favorite contemporary works, and elements of your piece remind me of it (though they are very different). I don’t know if you’ve heard it before, but I think you might find some inspiration for this piece in listening to it. At least, it will clarify what I’m trying to say with the solo interpretiveness. I do enjoy the stops; don’t let me convince you otherwise. All I was saying is don’t overuse them (it seems that the vast majority lot of the solo material is chords, so I was just suggesting a proportion change). Yes, these were more of the guesswork comments. I defer to your judgment; you’re the expert, not me. Still, I stand by my advice to include some sort of harmonic resolution. Remember that all great music has balance that helps to take the listener on a journey, especially in a large work like this. And I, as a listener with probably more exposure (though still a negligible amount) to contemporary music than the audience for when this work is performed, found the journey hard to engage with. Just something to keep in mind. By all means—write what makes you happy, though. That’s more important. I think the string-heaviness might just have been MIDI’s fault. You know the score better than I do. I’m glad that you’re working on the climaxes! I didn’t notice that. Good on you for bringing the motifs together. I think a lot of things with this where just stylistic differences. It seems that our tastes with contemporary music vary slightly—so write what makes you and the soloist happy and what you think best for the piece—not what makes me happy. Again, just reiterating that I enjoyed listening to your concerto.

I’m impressed! This is really well written. I have a few comments; take them with many grains of salt as most are stylistic and I’m not well-versed in the style of this piece—so they’re mostly blind and possibly irrelevant. Firstly, make sure you have a little note somewhere that says that the score is in concert pitch. I'm certainly not complaining though; it was far easier to follow the score not having to read a whole bunch of transpositions at once. Long ride for the solo part here. Be aware that some of the double/triple/quadruple stops and leaps you've inserted will probably be very difficult to execute at performance tempo. I'm sure your dedicatee is very talented, but make sure they're able to pull these off while maintaining the integrity of your markings (and of course good intonation and sound quality). I'm not really worried about impossibility, though, since I know you play the viola. One spot that caught my eye at the get-go: m. 19-23. Those leaps are really up there, and probably nigh impossible to execute while playing pianissimo. And then in 22-23, even though that passage is easier than 19-20, it's still going to be really hard to play quietly. Same for 64-66. That crescendo will probably end up quite a lot louder than mezzo-piano. The triple stops at 53-54 and 57 will also be very difficult just in terms of fingering and intonation. It also looks like the first two triple stops in m.70 are impossible. The first one will either require Db on the G string, A on the D string, open A, and B on the E string, or else a leap from the D string to E mid-double stop. The latter of these probably isn't feasible. I'd add a second A to the score to make it clear (if that's what you're going for, that is). The second triple stop requires both an Ab and Db simultaneously. Since these are on the G string, that isn't possible unless you notate the Ab as a grace note to indicate that it isn't part of the chord and should be played before the Db and Bb. But be aware that the triple (double?) stop won't sound as smoothly this way. But that's better than being impossible, right? As for m. 88, the G and C# double stop is impossible, no way around it. I might stop focusing (or focus less) on the solo violin with my comments for the rest of the piece, so I'd advise you to do a really good proofreading session for the violin part and check for feasibility. I probably missed other impossible double stops since I wasn't particularly looking for them, so make sure you screen the whole thing. On the high notes, it might be a good idea to put in harmonics (natural, not artificial) where you can. I know you've done this in several places to achieve a certain color. But putting them in more places (especially faster notes) will improve the intonation, won't change the tone color (too much, at least), and will make some of the high sections much easier. I'm writing that looking at m.109, where all of the notes could be harmonics and the part would become much easier and probably sound quite a lot better. Another thing; most of the difficulty in the piece is the double stops and the leaps, and a great difficulty they are. If I were your dedicatee, I would appreciate varied items of difficulty (for example, a fast passage could work well in the character of this piece). Also (this I'll talk about more later), expressiveness is my favorite challenge as a violist. Technical difficulty is all well and good, but there's not as much interpretation in that. Make sure you have plenty of chances for the soloist to express themselves as a musician--really, that's the most important part of any concerto--and not just show off their quadruple stop and shifting skillz. I enjoy the chords, though. Don’t mistake that for me saying I don’t. As for the style, I think you've done really well. I can't say that I know a lot (anything, really) about this style and won't pretend to, but here's one thing I do know: going back to one of my comments on the solo violin earlier, there need to be so many chances for the soloist to be expressive. That looks different for everyone. After reading your response, it’s apparent you’ve put a lot of thought into constructing the thematic material of the concerto. You’re fortunate to have a dedicatee for this concerto, which means (and maybe you’ve talked about this while meeting with them?) that you have the opportunity to insert passages exclusively suited to their creative voice. You said that the violinist isn't a huge fan of your compositional style. Adding more “traditionally” melodic segments to the soloist part could be a great way to make him/her enjoy the part much more and balance the style you’ve written in with their playing style. Additionally, that could even work really well as a way of contrasting the ensemble and soloist and providing opportunities for musical dialogue. Just food for thought. You also might consider adding just a few places where the harmony is more traditional (I’m saying that as someone inexperienced with this style, so again, grains of salt). I mentioned to you that post-romantic music is so enjoyable for me because the modern compositional techniques coupled with traditional elements make for more expressive, more impactful (to me) music. I'm not telling you to X out all of the long dissonant passages, but I would have enjoyed places of harmonic resolution (in terms of modern to traditional, not necessarily a cadence) Even if you just have these a little bit, everyone will be happier: the soloist, the orchestra, the audience (that's an important one), and even you, I'd wager, because the musical style will possess greater balance, making everything in the piece more meaningful. Think of whyThe Rite of Spring might be regarded as one of the greatest musical masterpieces of the 20th century even by general audiences—it’s very dissonant, very polytonal, right? For me, Stravinsky's masterstroke was to provide relief from all of the hard-on-the-ear material. He did this within movements, but also provided long sections of surprisingly consonant harmony. My favorite movement of the Rite is 'The Round-Dances of Spring’ because of the relief it brings—that makes both the traditional and contemporary aspects of the piece more impactful. I’m sure that his contemporary writing was also brilliant and there’s something to that too, but I’m no expert on that. Quinn said that the ending is too bombastic for the translucent texture, and he's right. I actually really like the end though. If you’d like to keep the end as it exists in this score, I just have some brainstorm-y ideas. I would vary the texture quite a lot more. Give more textural time to the woodwinds and brass. Based on just the sound of the MIDI recording, the concerto is very string-heavy (I’m not saying that after intensive score review); that isn't a bad thing (and a live performance would probably yield a very different texture), BUT even MIDI playback can make distinctions between different textures! I don’t even now how applicable that is to your piece, but it’s always good advice so I’ll leave it. Also, I missed out on a climax, which would make a louder ending smoother. Another thing: where are the color and character changes? Perhaps it's just because I'm not used to this style (or maybe just MIDI), but I couldn't really hear any. Anyway, I think that constitutes most of my feedback. This is really good, and I'm excited to see how it turns out! Jacob

Hi Peter, I just took notes as I was listening, so I apologize if these comments seem poorly organized. I think your texture could perhaps be more varied. You maintain a tutti texture the whole time. The suite is only five minutes long so it doesn't get tiresome, but varying the thickness would provide more interest (to me). I'm curious; how did you choose names for each of the pieces? The violas will hate you for their part in Melting Glacier. Just kidding 😉. BUT--see if you can't maintain your balanced texture whilst making the parts more engaging. The musicians that perform your music will love you for it. The Veldt was my favorite movement. Not only did you redeem yourself for the violas, but the thematic material was also the most engaging for me. Really well done here! In Mountain Climb, you might consider notating the time signature as 3 + 2 + 3 / 8 with a switch to 4/4 when the rhythm construction changes. The length of the measure won't change, but the meter you're going for will be clearer to the score-reader. With the horns, it seems like this could be better to score for one horn and one trombone/tuba/euphonium, depending on the desired timbre. Going from what I’ve read in orchestration textbooks (😂), the low horn has a very exhausting part that might be much more effective on a lower-pitched brass instrument. Regardless of how you do that, make sure you make it clear which player is playing at what time (you know, with 1, 2, or a2). Also: don't forget that wind instruments need to breathe! I've never touched a marimba, so I could be totally wrong here, but the places where you have a tremolo and a melody seem like they could be on the too-challenging side, even with four mallets. In terms of engraving, the score was really easy to follow; nice job with that. Do watch out when you're notating two instruments on one staff. Sometimes there were a few collisions (mostly in the horns). Overall, I really enjoyed the suite! It had a lot of charm and freshness that was helped along by the thematic consistency. I have one overarching comment for you that I touched on earlier: the texture, while balanced and put together well doesn't really vary, even from piece to piece in the suite. You do a good job of making up for that with thematic, rhythmic, and motivic interest, but re-orchestrating a little bit wouldn't hurt. Don't just vary the orchestration while maintaining tutti, though. Maybe you could give out a few solos, or give the melody to a lower instrument for a bit. A little more variance in terms of texture would go a long way towards improving this piece. I really hope that these comments didn't come off as too harsh. You did a really nice job with this suite and I look forward to seeing more of your work in this genre!

I really enjoyed this octet. The first movement almost reminded me of Britten's Playful Pizzicato. Each movement had its own character, but they fit together into a single piece well, as has been said. The first movement probably had my favorite character of the three. I found the second movement just a little tricky to follow in terms of the fugue. The music itself was wonderful, but I thought the subject blended almost too well into the surrounding counterpoint in several places. Perhaps it was just the dynamics of the rendering; several times the subject was in the foreground and glorious to hear! This isn't necessarily bad, but I do enjoy being able to follow the counterpoint in pieces like this. The rhythmic variability and unpredictability served you very well in the first movement, and also well here in the fugue. In terms of musical content, this was definitely my favorite movement. The third movement's frantic writing was very well executed and fit well with the other movements. I also enjoyed how the pizzicato connected the first and third movements a bit. The ending of this movement (and the piece) was perfect! I don't really have any specific comments (i.e., feedback about certain measures or sections) since the way the voices in the octet fit together plus the tempo made the score hard to follow. Congratulations on such a well-put-together work! Jacob

I'm really glad! Form is usually my struggle, so to hear that it was the highlight of Ballade means a lot. I think it's not so much the recording or the register as it is how much pedal I used in the recording. If I spend a good couple of months working on it and then perform it, my interpretation will have much, much less pedal. Did you see the comic I linked? Don't shoot the pianist is a favorite comic relief of mine. Again, the playing in the recording could be better. Thank you! I'm glad. I already talked about this a bit in my reply to Tónskáld, so I'll refer you to there for the detailed rundown of my struggles with more contemporary composition. I love all of those styles that you mentioned. I don't really consider myself a classical music elitist (though I will praise classical music above all other music until the day I die) and I listen to plenty of EDM and rock and whatever else (gotta be "culturally adjusted," y'know 😉) My struggle is amalgamating other techniques into my composition. I haven't tried yet, but I'm sure I could write something completely contemporary if I wanted to; but that isn't what I want to do. What I do want is to take those techniques and use them in my romantic composition so that I can have a more balanced and enjoyable style. I haven't listened to any of your pieces yet (I definitely will after posting this), so I'm blind as to your style, but do you have any ideas for that? I'm hoping to be pretty involved on here, so we'll probably keep interacting. Thanks for your detailed comments, and I'm looking forward to listening to your music and working together in the future!

Thank you! I think that was my favorite part about this piece being improvised—that the thematic references and unpredictability were completely unintentionally sophisticated. One of my self pet-peeves is my obsession with making the harmony of my music smooth and "sounding good" when the chord progression itself looks less than comfortable. For instance (forgive the poor figured bass formatting), the opening chord progression (m. 1-3) is ii ø4/3 - i 6/4- iv m7, which would probably have given my theory teacher nightmares. Yet, it doesn't sound particularly contemporary, at least to my ear. My very favorite period is post-romantic (1890-ish to 1930-ish), and despite that, my music ends up sounding like it's from the heart of the romantic period with the occasional Baroque prelude. In Cantus, too, there are some really odd harmonies, but they don't sound out of place one bit. It feels really weird to ask "How can I make my music sound uglier?" but that's almost what I want to do. I'd love to be able to compose in the post-romantic style (not sure about later stuff like only quartal harmony and whatnot), but for some reason...just am not able. I won't say I'm a huge fan of the contemporary period; I personally think atonality for the sake of atonality and edginess is an abomination, but that doesn't mean I can't enjoy places where consonance and emotion give way to brief moments of quartal harmony and polytonality. That's my favorite part about post-romanticism, actually—that the greater contrast makes the music more romantic. Interesting. m. 109 to the tempo primo is actually my least favorite theme. I love it, for sure, but not as much as the other themes. It's certainly necessary in the piece to provide relief from the muddiness and emotion and complexity of the rest, as you said. It's my favorite theme for its simplicity and freshness, but not for its musicality. Incidentally, my favorite theme is the first meno mosso (mostly just the first four bars), followed closely by the third meno mosso. You are right about the expression texts. There's a story behind this one, actually. Around the time I improvised Ballade, I was learning Albéniz's Fête-Dieu à Seville (fantastic piece; I highly recommend listening if you haven't heard it). Anyway, in the score, you wouldn't believe how meticulous Albéniz's markings were. Dynamics ranged from ppppp to fffff (I'm not even joking) with five expressive texts every measure and footnotes galore, etc., etc. I think Albéniz went over the top (the music is absolutely fantastic though) with those markings; but, one thing I noticed was that every single one of them helped me to hone my interpretation of the piece. So, ever since, I've used more expressive texts in my music. (Fun fact: the Adagio tranquillo is a semi-deliberate pastiche of the end of Fête-Dieu, and I'm sure there are other references to it [besides the dense score] that I haven't noticed.) Here's a link to Fête-Dieu in case you'd like a listen. Thanks for the engraving comments. That delicato is an easy fix, and I can add some fingering. About the molto, it's supposed to indicate that the crescendo becomes molto crescendo. Is there a way to make that clearer? Good to know. I already kind of touched on this. Do you have any tips on how to explore writing good less-Romantic music? I will clarify right now that Romanticism is the domain of my composer's heart and I don't mind that, but I certainly would appreciate knowing how to compose more than Baroque and Romantic music, or at least add contemporary elements to my Romantic music. Thanks so much for your thorough and well-thought-out review! It has helped me very much 🙂

Hello! I'm pretty new to the forum and just posted here for the first time yesterday (in the large ensemble section). I thought I might post another piece that I composed last year for the piano: Ballade in F-minor. With most of my pieces, I tend to improvise themes or notate melodies in my head and develop them at the piano. This piece took that method a step further; nearly all of the musical material and the sequence in which it appears came from a single improvisation (obviously, I heavily edited it during and after transcription to paper though). As such, Ballade has a very quasi improvisando feel throughout. This piece, because of how it was composed, was an opportunity for me to sharpen my editing skills. I suppose you all will be the judges of how well I did at that editing. Constructive feedback would be very much appreciated. There are a few different areas I'd enjoy feedback on, so choose your favorite (or favorites). What was your favorite part of the piece? What made it enjoyable? What did you dislike most about the piece? In a similar vein, which were your favorite and least favorite themes? Why? How did you feel about the different styles and moods present in each of the themes? How was the engraving? I'm sure that if you followed along with the score you noticed that it got very dense in several places. Were there any unclear markings (e.g., the floating ties at the Adagio tranquillo)? Are there any places where expanding to three staves would make the score more readable? Don’t be afraid to be specific here. Did anything in the piece feel out of place? How well did the consonance and dissonance throughout the piece balance? Did you feel that the Adagio tranquillo at the end was too big of a transition or a bad ending? Do you have any comments about my compositional technique (things like harmony, transitions, melodic writing, etc.)? How well did I execute the ballade form (use Chopin as a frame of reference)? What did this piece remind you of (could be a composer, piece, image, scene, or something else)? Any overall suggestions for improvement (in this piece and in general throughout my compositions and style)? I haven't tried to get this performed (yet), so for a recording, I just sightread the score this morning, worked on it for a bit, and then recorded it with my phone. The recording isn't super great, but it will definitely give you a better picture of the piece than Finale MIDI, even if it sounds like this. I'm also attaching the score below, so feel free to follow along. Thanks for listening to Ballade! I hope that you enjoy it. 10 November 2022: I've attached an edited score along with a recording. I'll leave the previous score (not the recording; it's not letting me have two mp3s), but be aware that "Ballade in F minor Score.pdf" is the edited score version. Also, my preemptive apologies for the poor performance of the coda. Ballade in F minor.mp3 Ballade in F minor.mp3

Thank you! I'm intrigued by your feelings about the choral style; that's an astute observation. I would love to hear more about why the style was both enjoyable and detracting. This is all so helpful. In regards to harmonic motion, yes, I think you're right. I'm starting to foray a bit into Baroque counterpoint, so improving my voice-leading is something I've been trying to work on. Vocal independence. I admit to struggling a bit with orchestrating the melody. Obviously, in traditional, theory-book voice-leading, the soprano always carries the melody. In a lot of choral music (but certainly far from most of it), this tends to be true as well. Orchestral music, I think, tends to have the most "vocal independence." In hindsight, I think I should have given more melodic attention to the 2nds. Even if it was something as simple as copy-pasting the 1st violin part into the 2nd and vice versa, the sound wouldn't change and the musicians would find more enjoyment. But I think your comment was more timbre-oriented. In my experience as a baritone, oftentimes. the low voices have the melody only when singing with the other low voices (and the sopranos and altos take a break for a verse or section); perhaps that's a bit of a cliché. Rather than giving a melody to the violas, celli, and basses while the violins rested, I tried to give the vast majority of countermelodies, suspensions, and other items of harmonic (and somewhat melodic) interest to the lower voices. And, although much of the subtler motivic development was in the lower voices, I did give those solos to the viola and cello at the end. Perhaps that atones for my sin a little bit? 😉 Yeah, the Italian... Sadly, I somehow didn't notice this until rehearsals had begun and it was problematic to revise and reprint the scores. You're right in saying that many of them are redundant. If this is miraculously ever performed again, fixing that is at the top of my list. In terms of the footnotes, those were a later addition (as were the bowings). When consulting with the conductor before the reading, he advised me to insert them for the players, just in case. But yes, a more experienced orchestra probably wouldn't need any of that. Thank you so much for your thoughtful comments! Jacob