Alex Weidmann

Hi Tunndy, I notice your glissando lines have gone a bit haywire in Bars 54-55. Also in Bars 23 and 41 Violin II, you should flip the direction of the note stalks to make it clear what's going on there. Same in Bar 61 Violin I. Bar 55: some rests need deleting in the harp and Violin I. Same in Bar 66 Bass Drum, and Bar 69 various instruments. Plus a few more places where you have unnecessary rests. Bar 74: voices need tidying. Other than that good job! Also liked your recent Liszt orchestration of "La Campanella".

Many thanks Mark for the kind words! As to playability, I've sent this piece to a virtuoso pianist: so I guess we'll find out! If not, I can always make changes. I know I can't play it at tempo!

I hadn't even noticed that! But you're right. I guess it just worked out that way by accident. I'm glad you liked the changes of time signature, as I wasn't sure about some of them. I did think of using more ottavas; but found I could read the ledger lines quite easily when playing it through myself. Will add them if the pianist requests it. N.B. The composer who inspired me to write this piece was Julian Scriabin, as I recently discovered his preludes on You Tube. Think my piece maybe sounds more like Rachmaninoff though? Many thanks for your interesting review! Alex

Many thanks Peter, for taking the time to listen and review. Yes please do! I'll be getting a real performance from a pianist in May: so I'll probably just wait for that, rather than trying to massage the midi rendition. Will bear your points in mind for the future though. That 9/8 bar originally had a short fermata on the middle note; but I decided to use a time signature change instead. Then I reproduced the same 4/4 to 9/8 in the recapitulation: so it is reflected later in the piece.

On playing this through myself tonight, I noticed a few further corrections and cautionaries that were required. So here is my latest version of the score.

Noticed a few hand clashes and enharmonic spelling errors today: so here's a revised draft. Also made a tiny change in Bar 8 (left hand). Hopefully better? It's still a bit of a beast, with awkward hand-crossings; but I wrote it for someone with great technical skills!

Hi to all my fellow musicians. Here's my latest piece for piano, that I spent the last two days writing. Haven't quite finished the phrasing and dynamics yet. I may possibly extend the work; but I'm not quite sure yet. Hopefully I haven't accidentally stolen ideas from other pieces I've heard? I know the initial chord progression of C#m to Am(maj7) came from a You Tube video; but can't remember which piece they were discussing. (Pretty sure it was from a film score; but can't remember which one.) Anyway, hope you like it. I wrote it for a concert in May. P.S. Can you guess which composer inspired me to write this? (N.B. Revised scores will be posted below.)

Hi Martin, This sounds experimental, which is always good! Some of your brass writing is very nice, and the cat vocalisations are hilarious! Overall the work feels a bit random at times, and maybe lacks coherence; but still an enjoyable listen. Alex

I see them. They're the tiny little arrows attached to the accidentals (see image below).

Thanks very much for your review Archie! The tab score is mainly for my benefit, so I can see what hand shapes are needed to play the chords I've written. Some of them look very awkward: so I'm sure these chords will have to be thinned down. I did wonder whether the strumming hand can sometimes assist the fretting hand. E.g. When you need to depress several frets near the top of the neck, and also one much lower down, close to the strumming area. I wonder whether the thumb of the strumming hand can be used to depress the low fret? Anyway I've manually edited the tab score now, so it's looking a bit more sensible (see below) Another thing I'm not clear about, is what happens when you release the frets while a chord is still ringing? Does this produce an unpleasant pitch change effect as the strings slacken? In my piece this fret release would be required, where I have chords in rapid succession. Anyway, thanks again, Alex

That is very cute! Have to admit I don't know the instrument. I have heard of the pipa, mainly because it comes free with GarageBand!

I've combined this piece into one staff now, and created a tab score. MuseScore does this automatically, which is really helpful! I was able to modify the score where it showed red highlight warnings on the tab score: so I think it's mostly playable now (touch wood!) The natural harmonics might still be problematic? Though if they're not achievable as natural harmonics, perhaps they could be played as artificial ones? Edit: and looking at the fret numbers, I guess I'll have to thin out some of those big chords!

I have some lyrics for this now. They're from two different translations of the Epitaph. I'm very inexperienced with fitting lyrics to music: so any advice would be really helpful!

Many thanks for your review, and the very helpful info sheets! Tbh, I didn't think about fingering at all. I'm hoping to get advice from a guitarist on that question. The natural harmonics are probably the most dubious part of my score: so will definitely have to revise those.

This piece is for a concert later this year. Just started on it tonight, and it's the first time I've written for guitar. So I'm sure it's probably unplayable! N.B. I decided to use two staffs to make it more readable. Think it would look very cluttered on a single staff.