Henry Ng Tsz Kiu

Hi @Matthew M ! This one does portray the joyful mood of summer in the poem! There are things to maybe take note of: First it’s the harmonic colour varieties. I know that you build a good contrast between G major and E major in two sections with different time signatures which is good. But within each section there is almost no modulations as each section remains in G major/E major which makes the moving force weakened. For the chamber writing there is almost no interaction between the instruments, they are all accompaniments which rarely carry melodic weight, and rhythm are more homorhythmic and usually in pairs. They almost always appear all together without some spots when you let some instruments rest, which lessen the variety of spacing and texture, More Instrumental Interludes should be added between stanzas/sentences to allow more varieties in texture and allow the instruments to sing the melody as well. The strings and piano should have slurs to indicate Bowing/ legato playing/ phrasing. @Wieland Handke and @MK_Piano are right on the marking of syllables, as for the melismatic notes you would need to indicate which syllables would be sung with which notes by hyphen. Also vocal scoring is a bit different: grouped notes represent they will cover a syllable, while separate note-head represent syllabic lyrics. So for example for your first three words “so on a”, the three Ds should be marked as 3 separate notes instead of grouping together. The high B5 and D6 in b.37-39 would be really difficult to sing with even for sopranos. And you should add more rests for the soprano to breathe! Now it almost becomes a never ending Wagnerian melody with no spots to breathe! Thx for joining the competition! Henry

Hi @JDevorMusic ! Technically this should be the most complete piece of the competition! The harmony and mood are the most varied, the use of motives very notable and coherent, instruments, like @Fruit hunter noted, are extended to their utmost potential. I like your use of whole tone scale which definitely makes the music sound impressionistic and French. The piece keeps moving forward because of the varying textures when you allow some moments of quieter passages with fewer players. Like @MK_Piano I think the piece less related to the original poem and the competition theme. But this one is subjective as we all have our own interpretations on poems. But the piece stands alone well! Thx for sharing and joining the forum! Henry

Hi fellow @latebeethoven_addict ! This piece has some really nice melody and warm mood. One thing I notice is that within section you do not modulate which make the piece less interesting harmonically. The whole piece is never in minor. Even though the poem itself is beautiful and "positive", you can add more varied harmonic color in the piece. The use of rhythm is varied enough. The passage in b.66 accidentally reminds me of Chopin etude op.25 no.6 lol! The use of high register piano fast notes in b.108 is beautiful and you capture "breeze" there really well! The ending is lovely as well. Thx for sharing! Henry

Hi @Ninja Nolan ! I like the idea of using different movements to present contrast. The opening movement sounds like an introductory chorale to the piece while the last movement sounds like an ending chorale to the piece, much like the structure of a cantata. The centre movement is the main statement of the piece to me and I love the vivacity of the march, it sounds like opera buffa to me. I am expecting that after the Ab major trio the Eb major march will return as in a da capo piece. I think the texture of the piece can be more varied: mostly it is chordal except the march, and even in the march it works in pairs so rhythmically the whole piece sounds less varied. I think you can also add more contrast inside movement 1 and 3 as well, instead of only having the contrast between movements. Also it would be great if there are some coherence of materials between movements, but this point is subjective! Harmonically it's Baroque and more traditional. And for the text, I think the 3rd movement shouldn't be tragic as in your music with the corresponding stanza: And when the evening comes, the caressing breeze That plays in your veils shall be sweet, And the peaceful gazes of the stars Shall smile benevolently upon the lovers.I myself cannot link the tonic G minor with the happiness of the stanza. The 3rd movement sounds more like a contemplative reflection of something sadder than portraying peace and love in the poem. But this point is also personal and subjective! Thx for sharing! I know I am nitpicky in this comment, but I do like the music especially the 2nd movement, thx for joining the competition! Henry

Hi @Wieland Handke ! For the accordion, probably only @Omicronrg9 can talk about the accordion since he's an accordionist (I'm summoning you here Daniel). Btw, the instrumentation of this piece is almost exactly the same with Daniel's group. I think you are using an orchestral mind for this chamber work. There are lots of careful doublings of melodies and countering parts. I think the texture of this piece is the most varied in the entries I have listened to so far! What is your purpose to introduce fugato in this piece? Is it related to the narrative strcuture? Just one thing: I actually do not really like the ' pulse between the passages which I think it will hinder its flow. My favourite passage is section F when the texture and harmony are less complicated, it really gives good contrast with passages before it. I at first don't like too much of the harmony since I think the dissonance is not neccessary, but after my 2nd listening I suddenly find they are necessary to convey the melachony with the usage of accordion, good job on that! Thx for sharing! Henry

Hi @Musicman_3254 ! I quite like the pentatonic language and the ending some very Chinese to me! But like @MK_Piano noted the piece can be more varied in terms instrumentation. More interactions between the instruments can be added and variation of textures with some more polyphony would be good. Now the piece is predominantly homophonic and sometimes heterophonic. Another thing is the change of harmony and keys. The music is mostly in Gb major with pentatonic setting which makes the piece sounds a bit monotomous and not moving forward becauase of lack of conflict and drama and dissonance (disclaimer: I love the key and setting since I exactly use the same setting for my Sextet in Gb major!!!!!). Apart from the harp issue, for the instrumentation I'm not sure the wind player can play the opening notes that long unless they have circular breathing technique. For the harp players playing glissando is a deafult, so in passages like in b.43 you should rather notate "non-arpeggio". For the score presentation, Cello never uses alto clef but you use it right at the beginning and many later passages!. For strings only viola uses alto clef. Cello only uses Bass, Tenor and Treble clef! Also I think Baritone wil prefer bass clef to alto clef. Thx for sharing! Henry

Hi Mason! @MK_Piano (Not Mark lol) This one is a passionate entry, it for sure matches the original poem: passionate love in bright summer. I actually agree with @Fruit hunter that this one is a love song (but ofc a very good one!) No doubt you and @UncleRed99 are great friends as I see many things similar in your music: melodic, moody, simplistic, con moto and affectionate. The chamber writing is interactive with constant interactions between parts. I think there can be more variation in texture such more counterpoint between the strings: they usually move in a more homorhythmically. I think in some moments you can invite countermelodies as well. But that climax at the end is greatly achieved with the homorhythms with good variation to the original A section. Your engraving is so better than mine! One thing I also note is the key scheme of the piece: The piece is mainly in G major and E minor. Since I have listened to a lot of Scarlatti Sonatas lately, I would love to see more modulations and keys invited in the piece for more contrast, even though the contrast between G major and E minor is already quite good. WIth the less varied key scheme many of the harmonic patterns and sequence are more predictable and less surprising which to me makes the love less exciting. I may sound harsh in this review but it's all personal and I do like your work haha. Thx for sharing! Henry

Hi @Fruit hunter ! I really like this piece, again like the last competition piece you write with percussion instruments and portray childhood (to me). This time your instrumentation is more keyboard based and I really like your usage of vibraphones with tone clusters which create a distant and nostalgic mood of the past. To me the slow sections are passages representing the attempt to get into the past memories and the fast sections are those vivid childhood memories. The passage in b.51 is so funny, it's like when the students are playing the school bell rings and the play is somewhat forcefully stopped. (Even though here it's the memory stopped) What I like less is the passage in b.131. I know you want to change the mood of the piece but the instrumentation there reminds more of a religious setting than a nostalgic setting, which sounds a bit out of place to the entire piece. Like Mike some of the passages I need to leave the earphone because of the high frequency and volume, particularly passages after b.162. I think for the mallet issue even if you can change them instantly yourself, it's always more friendly to the percussionist some seconds to change the mallets. Like @Luis Hernández said there's a lot to learn from this piece. Thx for sharing! Henry

Hey Vince! It's real fun playing this one! The time signatute looks and sounds difficult at first so I needed to clap rhythms on my legs first, but once I got through that it's much easier to play! The rhythm and use of pattern here reminds me of your Prelude no.9 which I also enjoy entirely: So in my playing I play it a bit faster, add some pedals, articulations, and whenever there's repetition of phrases I usually play the 2nd time with a slightly stronger dynamic. If you enjoy listening to this Prelude, you will enjoy it 10 more times by playing it! Thx for sharing this wonderful work Vince! I know you're getting busy but really hope you drop more great pieces to us! 💋 Henry

Hi @Markus Boyd ! Sorry for a long delay for replying! Actually not only this movement but the entire piece is predominantly in minor. My story to tell is about despair, the feeling of it and the struggle of it with hope. When you are struggling it's easy you lose all hope in the world, so I don't put balance of major/minor in this work. In fact the portion of Eb major is increasing during movements and the work will end in it instead of C minor to represent some hope! During this movement it will be me to be crazed by the despair completely till exhaustion, and after that you will start reflecting, which is the theme of the 3rd movement. In that emotional state I believe there won't be much drama from major/minor, rather it will be a deep dive into the despair in minor. Henry

Hi @Scriabinian ! Sorry for such a long delay! I would love to have it played in real life too, but that will be a bonus only. Thank you for your compliment! Henry

Hi @Luis Hernández ! Thx for your reply! I always want to reply but I'm too busy right now ao it causes a really long delay! Thank you Luis. I know how knoweledgeable you are with musix theory and to earn a compliment from you is an honor. I do think in terms of counterpoint and hopefully it's not too bad haha! Henry

Yeah before revision I think the fugues are the main courses but during this revision I realised how important those Laments are in the structure. I really love them too given how straight away I express my emotion there, why in fugues the emotions are more indirect. Yup the modulation is pretty tame becausr this is the 1st time I write an entire fugal movement so I don't know how to modulate better like what I did in the Sextet fugue later, but I think the more modest modulations help the movement stay in the mood, hopefully. Thx! I really like the parts when despair comes back, they are emotionally and technically better passages! Henry

Haha thx Alex! When I composed I seldom stick to any plan. This structural graph is made only after I finish the piece and me acting as the analyst rather than the composer haha. When I write I'm probably the same as you to write with instinct and polish them later. Indeed, it takes longer than I thought. I am almost finish with the whole piece as the 4th movement is almost done! It would be a bonus but I'm not that eager to have the piece performed in real life. Henry

This is the 3rd movement of my Clarinet Quintet in C minor, which is completed 4 years ago and I'm revising it. Thx to my friend Vince @Thatguy v2.0 for making the audio! Here is the pdf, audio, video of the movement. I have also made a structural graph since this movement is a fugal one and I want to show the structure more clearly. https://youtu.be/QMQyFbriSmM (For YT)Clarinet Quintet in C minor 3rd mov Final Version 20260906.pdfClarinet Quintet in C minor 3rd mov Final.mp3Clarinet Quintet 3rd Mov Structural Plan.pdf To me this is core movement in the piece and my favourite. After 2nd movement's anxious power I finally calm down to reflect subjectively and (more)objectively, which are represented by Lament and Fugue respectively with the following structure: 0:00 1st Lament, using the despair [0134] motive again, then incorporate the (future) fugue subject in the clarinet while strings keep lamenting, and ends with one more question of despair. Real lament after what is suffered in the first 30 minutes of the work. 1:10 1st Fugue. Appearance of prime form of the subject. I always go for F minor in any secondary themes or answer in my C minor works because G minor is always too weak for C minor. Only F minor is dark enough for it. First stretto in 3:05. Ends in F minor with angry despair. 4:03 2nd Lament. A complete new part for this movement added only in this final version, sounds more dissonant than anything else in the movement, further intensifies the pain. 5:00 2nd Fugue. Using the retrograde form of the subject as main subject, denoting the backward reflection of me on despair. The flow here is also more fluid. [BACH] in viola in 6:56. Prime subject joins again in 7:16 to have stretto with the retrograde subject. Ends in F minor again with augmented subject in 8:07. 8:25 3rd Lament. My favourite of the movement, the sheer pain especially in 8:41-9:00 always aches my heart. But human beings only change after pain and I am no exception, so after this painful passage some hope is finally invited to the party to modulate to E flat major for next part. 9:40 3rd Fugue. Using the inverted form of the subject as main subject, denoting the complete upside down of thought from despair to hope. Later the retrograde inversion form of the subject enters in 11:08 to represent even further distance from despair. The climax in 11:48 is the most hopeful passage in what's happened in the entire Quintet up to this point. But after it doubts continue to enter. Despair starts invading in 12:42, and in 13:18 the prime form in tonic c minor enters in a subconscious Viola entry plus an augmented 2nd violin entry. I think a lot on whether to extend the transition or not, but finally I just decided to keep it this way since an early defeat of hope can represent the cruelty of despair and the weakness of hope more. I love the sheer pain here, and the return of prime subject on cello in 13:40 means the struggle of hope is futile. An E flat major prime entry on Clarinet try to struggle once more but falls to despair again, a final prime subject on cello in 14:11 announces the defeat of hope. The section ends on a German Sixth chord to leave the music suspended. 14:36 Final Lament and coda. Solo by Clarinet, wants to escape by quoting the dream motive in G flat major like in 1st movement but has to accept despair. In 15:19 the opening returns to remind unsettled affair. In 15:36 all four forms of subject appear for a final conclusion and lament and acceptance of despair and tragedy. Only by acceptance you may recover from it. The biggest change I made in this revision is the addition of 2nd Lament and repetition of 1st Lament. This is my original plan but with the bad sound sample I deleted them in my final draft. But now with Vince's great rendition I think it's better to retain them and extend the Laments to match the overall narrative structure. I also change the entrance order of the instrument, some counterpoint and details here and there etc. In terms of fugal treatment I make use of all four forms (prime, retrograde, inversion and retrograde inversion) of the same subject to denote the ups and downs, thinking backward and forward of me, so they are not merely fugal devices but also have narrative function. Hopefully you enjoy the movement, feel free to criticize it and leave comments here. It's a long movement and a long description, and I gratefully thank you if you listen and read till the end! P.S Here are YC posts of previous movements: 1st Mov: 2nd Mov: Henry