jesuswaffle

A short piece built on a whole-tone scale. It has a slow-fast-slow-fast structure. All of the material is derived from the opening slow section, but it's not particularly thematically tight. Most of the interest is in the rhythms; there isn't really anything going on as far as harmony goes. nhomas - Thought Process - SoundCloud Apologies for the lack of score. I sequenced it in Reason, and I tried my darndest to get a decent score out of Finale, but it got all the rhythms wrong when importing the MIDI file, and given that I have no intent of getting this performed, I finally decided that it wasn't worth it. Sorry guys!

I like the main theme a lot. It's very bouncy and cheerful. A fairly listenable piece overall, as well. My two complaints: 1. Your dynamic markings seem a little off to me. They feel sort of random, if you know what I mean. Consider using them more sparingly, and placing them more judiciously. 2. A lot of the transitions feel awkward and abrupt. Try smoothing things out; giving the piece an overall sense of coherency. Easier said than done, of course. Try studying the works of other composers, to see how their pieces are put together. You might also be interested in reading this (free) ebook on musical structure: http://www.musique.umontreal.ca/personnel/Belkin/bk/index.html

Here's an excellent explanation of how to properly use phrasing marks when writing for wind instruments: http://www.mti.dmu.ac.uk/~ahugill/manual/clarinet/movies/tiprearticulation.mov (It's explained in the context of the clarinet, but exactly the same principles apply for all wind instruments.)

Well, I hate to further digress this thread, but I'd like to ask the OP about Lilypond. I've experimented with it a fair amount in the past, and I'd really like to typeset my music in it. However, there's one aspect of it that I've never gotten past, which is that you have to write out each part separately, rather than together. I was wondering if you had any tips or tricks for dealing with that. (I've tried using parallelMusic, but it doesn't seem to be possible to typeset percussion or chord names within the parallelMusic environment. Of course, if there's a way around that, I'd love to hear about it, as well.)

Sure. Sequencer programs are pretty similar to notation programs, but they use a 'piano roll' interface instead of staff notation, which would be more intuitive for someone familiar with the piano keyboard but not with staff notation. They're not suited for producing readable printed scores, so they're not to be used if you're composing for human performers, but they're well-suited to composing music to be played by computer synthesizers. Sequencers typically have features more oriented towards computer-generated, electronic music: their sound libraries have more synthesizer-type sounds, and fewer 'real instrument' sounds. They typically have larger sound libraries than notation programs, and are more flexible in the ways you can manipulate the sounds. You can also learn to program your own sounds if you want to, for additional creative power. A good Windows sequencer program for beginners is Fruity Loops. If you have a Mac, Garage Band is a good choice, since you already have it.

I like it. Very fun piece. One thing that occurred to me: wind instruments are very agile, and you could have exploited that fact more in your piece, maybe using some large intervals like you do in the piano part. I think it might have contributed to the overall effect. Just a thought. Also, I didn't find the doubling between the piano and the clarinet around m.44 to be particularly convincing. My understanding is that doubling of parts is, as a rule, best reserved for ensembles larger than 10 players or so. (I could be wrong on this one.) Maybe you could have the piano play a bassline for the clarinet instead. Anyway, nice piece! Thanks for sharing!

Regarding the subject: I think I see what you're getting at. I'm thinking that if I were to modify the subject, I might change the first high C to an F, and possibly the first G in the second measure also to an F. Good suggestion. Regarding the parallel octaves: those are an error; thanks for spotting them. (There's quite a bit of parallel movement which was intentional (mostly thirds).) The notes right before the last chord were an error. Thanks for taking the time to read my piece!

Okay! This is my first finished composition. It is a brief fugue (written in a rather brief length of time :thumbsup:) for two tin whistles. For those not familiar with the instrument, a tin whistle is a simple wind instrument, somewhat similar to a recorder. It has a range of two octaves, and it's tuned diatonically; a given whistle can only play in two major keys, plus their harmonic minors. (I call for C whistles, which can play in C and F major.) Obviously, the limitations of the instrument were a source of difficulty; writing even a two-voice fugue in the space of two octaves is a little tricky, and having only two keys at my disposal limited my choices for modulations somewhat. Also, I had a bit of trouble trying to do a two-voice fugue with two wind instruments, the difficulty being giving the instrumentalist a place to breathe without messing up the texture! I kinda got lazy about letting the players breathe near the end :toothygrin:, but I think that the piece could be made playable with some small modifications. Comments and constructive criticism appreciated! You know the drill. fugue-1.mid fugue-1.pdf fugue-1.sib

Excellent effort for a first piece, IMO. My main complaint is that I don't find your transitions very convincing. You sort of jump from one idea to the next, without preparing the listener for the next idea. So that's something that you may want to focus on in the future.

Very nice! Seems like excellent soundtrack music. Two comments: 1. The full bar of silence at bar 35 or so didn't seem very convincing to me. 2. At bar 46, you introduce a very nice rhythmic motif, which I kept expecting to pop up again, but it only came up a few more times. I think that you should give it a few more appearances.

Very beautiful piece! I loved it. Really suited my mood tonight. Two criticisms: 1. I felt that the harp piece could have used a touch variation, rather than just copy-paste. Just a little; nothing too drastic. 2. The ending felt abrupt. Extend it a little; give it a stronger sense of resolution. That viola part does indeed look impossible, btw. The harp part doesn't look easy, either. I don't play either instrument, though; maybe someone who does could comment?

Okay, listening to the second one. A lot of the same comments apply as with the first one. I enjoyed the short, poppy interlude at about 12:00. If not for being in Dutch, it would fit in very nicely on the radio here in the U.S.

Well, this is just awesome. I've only listened to the first part so far, but I really like it. I love how it alternates between chilled-out, atmospheric ambiance and head-banging instrumental pieces. The processed political samples are a great touch. The ambient sections really remind me of DJ Shadow. One suggestion: I think that you should bite the bullet and split these into tracks. Yes, it makes sense to listen to them together, but, in my opinion, it's just too much when taken all together. It's like if you were writing an essay, and you wrote it all as one paragraph. Also, it would be possible for me to comment on each track individually if I knew which track I was listening to. More updates as I listen to the rest of the project. Also, while I enjoyed it, I don't think that you're going to get many responses on this forum, since this is rather far away from of the usual subject matter that gets posted here.

Hi! Long-time lurker, first-time poster, etc. I've done a bit of experimenting with live electronics. Mostly messing with software synthesis, effects, and live looping tools. I haven't done much with MAX or Csound or any of those; not my area of expertise. As for livecoding, I think it's silly. I'm a computer programmer, and I would love to be able to combine my passion for music with my passion for code, but all I can picture when you say "livecoding" is a hapless performer spending 20 minutes looking for the missing comma in his program, while the audience throws rotten tomatoes. On a more optimistic note, there's a lot of truly excellent software for live music out there, so you have a lot of options. Unfortunately, most of my music work so far has been under Linux; I only recently installed Windows (for Sibelius). So, most of the software I've worked with only runs on Linux. One program I had a lot of fun with, which you can use if you have a Mac, is Freewheeling. (If you don't have a Mac, apparently Ableton Live is a similar program, but it's not free, and I haven't tried it out.) Freewheeling Freewheeling is described by the creator as follows: Freewheeling is a new way to be In The Muse-ical Moment. It's a live looping instrument that returns us to the joy of making music spontaneously. If you've ever seen a performance with a looping pedal, Freewheeling is essentially an elaborate, software-based version of just that. If you haven't, you might want to check out the demo video; it's quite cool. http://freewheeling.sourceforge.net/video/fw-demo1.avi This might or might not be what you're interested in, of course. So, I'll throw something else out, too. This guy, for his thesis, did a piece using an acoustic guitar and a computer. He established some sort of scheme where the computer would analyze his improvisations coming in in real-time and produce some sort of accompaniment to go along with it. I don't fully understand it, but looking at it might give you some inspiration. He's got an MP3, a short paper, and a score. OhioLINK ETD: Bukvic, Ivica In the way of hardware, you mentioned upgrading your computer. Speaking from my own experience, I'm betting that probably isn't necessary, unless your machine is really decrepit. I have a pretty humble 2GHz machine, and it's never felt underpowered for real-time audio. I've done some pretty intensive stuff with it, and it's handled things very well. So, don't rush out to upgrade your computer just yet. You may find that what you've already got will take you farther than you imagine. (Of course, as I said, most of my music work has been under Linux, which, if my experience with Windows so far is any indication, works an order of magnitude better than Windows when it comes to the demanding real-time requirements of live music. Maybe things would work better under Windows with a fast computer. As with all things technology-related, your mileage may vary.) If you do want to drop some money on cool electronic toys, you have plenty of options. The first would be a new audio interface (sound card) for your computer. Your computer probably came with a fairly crappy sound card, and by getting a good one, you get several benefits: * Higher quality recording and playback. * Lower latency. (That is, faster response times; the delay from you playing into the mic and it coming out of the speakers is smaller. This actually matters more than you might imagine for live playing.) * A proper MIDI interface. That's a nice segue into the other type of hardware you can drop some coin on, which is MIDI devices. But first I'm going to recommend a sound card. I've had very good luck with the E-MU 1212m. It's very affordable (as these things go), and it gives you a great bang for your buck. It gives you two analog audio inputs as well as MIDI input and output. Plus, it comes with digital inputs, which means that you can add as many as 16 more audio inputs with an external converter if you feel the need to expand. As for latency, the best I've been able to get is 5 milliseconds, which is pretty good. Not the best, but pretty good. (Side note: the 1212m is for desktop machines, not laptops. If you have a laptop, you'll want the E-MU 0404, which is basically the laptop version of the same thing.) Right, then. MIDI devices. These really make the difference for doing live electronics. A MIDI device, in this context, is just a fancy, music-oriented input device for your computer. These things are pretty essential if you want to actually interact with your laptop while performing with another instrument. They make the difference between playing stuff, twiddling the computer, then playing more stuff, and twiddling the computer right in the midst of playing. Of course, if you don't want to interact directly with the computer while performing, it's not a problem. Anyway, if you're interested, two big types of MIDI devices are control surfaces and pedalboards. Control surfaces. A control surface is just a box with a bunch of knobs, sliders, and buttons on it, which you can assign to control parameters in your software. Good for controlling effects or whatever while you're playing. Much less difficult than using a mouse. Pedalboards. These are boxes with a bunch of foot pedals on them. You leave them at your feet while you're performing, and you can use the pedals to trigger effects or whatever in your computer. Similar to what you were talking about earlier; basically a software equivalent of an effects pedal. The possibilities go beyond that, though. I'm currently in the midst of building one of these devices for the purpose of controlling Freewheeling: recording and triggering loops, and things like that. Another obvious example of a MIDI device is a keyboard, but that's not much use to you unless you play keyboard. Some other instruments have been adapted to MIDI, as well. You can buy MIDI guitars, and MIDI flutes, to name a couple. I don't know about trombones. MIDI instruments let you use your instrument to control a software synthesizer. I work almost exclusively that way when I use my keyboard with my computer. If you're comfortable with hacking electronics, you can even build your own MIDI devices. Some people have taken apart turntables and turned them into MIDI devices. Others have figured out how to turn Nintendo's Wiimote into a MIDI device. Almost anything could potentially be a MIDI device. Anyway, sorry for the long post. Welcome to the world of electronic music! There's never been a better time for electronic music than now. Computers are very powerful, and there's lots of flexible software available for them, and there are lots of flexible MIDI devices available that let you control your software in whatever way is most natural for you. The possibilities are limited only by your imagination.