musicninja

These are several books that I have used throughout the past couple of years that have helped me: Tonal Harmony by Stefan Kostka and Dorothy Payne - this book gives a lot of information about voice leading, chord analysis, part-writing, etc. Though this book has been very helpful for me there are some flaws with it. While many of the music examples are helpful, some are not. Also, some of the wording of the text is confusing and only seems to complicate things, but a majority of it is very informative and has helped me considerably when composing. Hearing and Writing Music by Ron Gorow - Though this book primarily focuses on ear training, I have found it to be an excellent resource for writing for instruments I am not too familiar with. It has a section dedicated to talking about the different instrument groups, how to write for them, their ranges, and how to notate the different ways of playing them. I have also heard that Understand Post-Tonal Music by Miguel Roig-Francoli and Music Composition by Reginald Smith Brindle are also very helpful books, however I have not read through them personally. I hope this has helped, and have fun composing!

Thanks for the feedback everyone! Paginani - I'll try cutting out part of the middle section and see how it is without the glissandos.

This is a piece I've started over winter break. This isn't the beginning of the piece - it was just in my head so I had to write it down. I'm not quite sure how to handle the beginning but I have a few ideas - it will probably be fuller orchestration in the beginning though with a lot of brass, but then again I'm not 100% sure. :) I'd appreciate it if you could listen to it and give me some feedback and suggestions. Thanks! December 2007-2.MUS

Yes, that would probably help - especially in the 1st violin part. Also, it might help if you end with the tonic C in the bass (which you've done) AND in the violin - that can also give it a more close-chord feel. I would suggest substituting the three E's the violin plays for either E and C at the top or G and C. I hope this helps. Once again, nice job!

I really like the musical themes you use however, like Cransworth said, it does seem to jump around a little too much. I would suggest taking your main themes and repeating them, or parts of them, throughout the piece to sort of tie it all together. One more thing - I felt that the ending chord was too open and didn't give a complete closure to the piece, but that could just be me too. :) Overall I really liked the different themes and I thought the more complex rhythms added a lot to the piece and made it really sound like fire. Nice work!

I just added a MIDI file - I didn't know how to create one from Finale before, so for those of you willing to critique I would be happy to have some feedback. Thanks!

Wow! Very nicely done. I liked the transitions you used from section to section and the amount of contrast between parts. Very well written.

Thanks for the feedback! The string ensemble at my school is reading this piece for me right now and I could go either way with the glissandos - it sounds good sometimes, depending on how the cellist plays it. Thanks again!

Thank you. Do you know how to turn a Finale file into a midi file? I know how to turn it into a wav file, but not a midi file.

I have recently finished this piece and would appreciate some feedback on it. I'm trying to decide whether or not I should add another middle section or if it is too repetitive so if you could leave me some suggestions that would be great! Thanks! Chon Ji Final.MUS Chon Ji.MID