walkingwikipedia

Nirvana69, Throughout my time at high school, I had to contend with arguments on the merits of pop music all the time, and many attempts by people to show me some non-mainstream pop music that they thought I may like. I have also previously read through the thread you linked to in your post. Despite all this, I still do not like pop music. I have my reasons for this, and they are robust. I see you are in no mood for debate on the issue (and nor am I), so I do not wish to elaborate. However, I still do have respect for the views of those who like both pop music and classical music. I would appreciate it if likewise you could have respect for my views in disliking pop music. Upon posting that I have a dislike for pop music, I have received two responses. The first called me "moronic", the second (yours), a "n00b". Perhaps if you wish to be persuasive on the matter of pop music, or at least foster respect for it, it would help if you did more than just spout out insults.

Yes, really There has not yet been ONE piece of pop music that I like. I believe that it does not have the substance required in a good piece of music, and I do not appreciate being called moronic for believing this. If you are similarly lacking in substance, unable to think of a way in which pop music is at the same intellectual level as a good piece of classical music (or to make some valid point in response to my post), then I would request you stay quiet, rather than resort to insults. For my part, let it me known that if I would consider anyone to be lacking in intellegence, it would be those who consider pop music as being equal to, or superior to, classical music.

Yeah, Martinu is an interesting composer to me. His pieces seem generally quite mediocre (I still remember my trumpet teacher showing me the Martinu sonata and saying "the main challenge when playing this piece is to not get bored"). Having said that, he has occassionally come up with a piece that impresses me. I do quite like the third symphony for example...

Hmm... Where to start? There are the obvious candidates like the Pachelbel canon, but I am assuming here that I am comparing my tastes in music to those of people with some musicality, so I'll leave such pieces alone. Right now, my pet hates: Vaughan Williams: The Lark Ascending Schubert: Symphony No. 8 (Unfinished), particularly the second movement Chopin: The Piano Concerti Tchaikovsky: 1812 Overture Rachmaninov: Symphony No. 2 Rossini: Thieving Magpie Overture Brahms: Violin Concerto All Pop Music (already said, but I agree completely) Well, it's a start. There are plenty more, and I may return to let off some more steam at a later stage. Oh, and to ANYONE who said Mahler, Shostakovich or Sibelius, :angry::(:sadtears::angry:

Personally I don't have a problem with British composers using folk tunes, or at least writing tunes that sound like them. I mean, the Russians have been doing it for ages, it's just part of the nationalistic style and in the case of British music does work very well in conjuring up images of the country.

It's a very competant piece of music and I enjoyed listening to it. However, as a listener very familiar with the Bartok concerto for orchestra (and a great fan of it), I felt that this concerto for orchestra movement had inherent similarities to the Bartok first movement. While by your own confession this is not a coincidence, I would advise as a listener trying to strive for some difference between you and Bartok, simply because as it is you are putting yourself in direct competition with him. Throughout this piece, all I could really think about was how I'd rather listen to the Bartok, and if you want people to absorb YOUR music, this isn't desirable!

Very nice, but it really needs to be listened to in the context of a wider piece of music to be fairly commented on.

I would just like to briefly join in here and warn Weca that you're getting into dangerous territory here. To criticise modern composers because their concert music isn't played as much as that of dead composers is very risky. This phenomenon of the music of dead composers becoming more popular is one that started when Brahms was in his prime. History has taught us that much music that stands the test of time is not music that always catered to the masses.

Thanks for taking the time to respond, flint-wwrr. I fully intend to correct layout issues during my next revision of this piece, but I will keep the score in C until then for ease of use. Your other comments were quite useful - "beefing up" the piece is something that I thought I had done enough of, but I will do more now. As for the Bb trumpets, being a trumpeter myself I wrote the parts with Bb in mind. If players are likely to ignore such an instruction, I think I will make it clearer, but for this piece, I would definitely want the tone of Bb instruments.

Hi This is a short piece (5:30) that I have been working on for some time now. After much refining it is at a stage where I feel ready to present it to other people. What I would like as a result is some constructive comments as to where the piece could be improved. I intend to revise it soon, and such comments would be greatly appreciated. Anything that occurs to you when listening is useful. Also, I am stuck for a title for the piece... suggestions? Attached is a pdf and sibelius file. There is also a midi, but I would advise accessing it only if you can't read sibelius files, as some of the sound sets become a little confused when I export from sibelius. Even just using the sibelius file for listening is better. I think there have been some issues with the installation of GPO on a computer networked to mine. I apologize for any inconvenience here and hope it doesn't put you off listening. Thanks in advance for listening. shortorchestra.pdf shortorchestra.sib shortorchestra.mid

Any chance of a score?

Not a bad piece... I quite liked the rhythm you used in the first variation (the one starting with a demisemiquaver). I don't think it is practical to have the second violin playing the quaver-quaver-minim rhythm at the same time though, in terms of actually playing the piece. In the second variation, I think you should use less octave-doubling, partly because the piece would benefit from some harmonisation, and partly because when you do harmonise I felt it "stuck out" a bit. You also need to have this in mind and look at the ending of the piece, as it feels somewhat "sudden" and the piece doesn't sound like it has ended.

Admittedly instruments in octaves does have a very cool effect, and I wouldn't be put off completely from using them if this is what you want. I would suggest though that you be sparing in your use of them. Furthermore, when you do use them, make sure the material is quite interesting/at the right place. Also consider the technical demands this can place on the performing group.

Personally I think you just need more material (but not more length). When you have the whole orchestra going, at times it looks like you have just used the copy and paste tool. Without going into specifics, I would just like to ask you to fix this, and add some interest into the piece - this is what full orchestral writing requires. When you don't have the full orchestra going, you have some good ideas and techniques. Unfortunately it was just a little boring. I think it would help at such points if you were to embellish the ideas being played out and/or added some simple harmonic underpinning. Quite a good piece though. Sounded quite disturbing (in a good way!).

I quite liked this piece and felt that it did sound well-crafted and fluent. Overall, if you were aiming for the style of Beethoven... then I think you achieved it, given where you are at in terms of composing, so in that sense you're on the right track. What I would suggest in this piece is possibly looking for another theme to incorporate in there. I think you took a somewhat uninspiring theme at first and developed it very well throughout into a satisfying product. Looking through the piece however, it appeared that all the significant material was derived from the one theme. If you gave yourself more musical material to work with, you could extend this work to a more satisfying length and give more scope for development.