deathraider

That's exactly how I felt during the performance!

Definitely! I'm not sure who would be interested, though. I kind of wrote them specifically for the contest and then I didn't win. :P Thanks!

Just got the recording of Wednesday's performance! The organist kind of made a major boo-boo in the middle, but besides that it went really well. :) BTW, they ended up doing a hybrid accompaniment using piano and organ. It ended up creating a really nice effect. Gaudete omnes - performance by USU Chamber Singers

Out of curiosity, what choir are you writing for?

In measure 76 it's kind of awkward how you emphasize the second syllable in "forward" when the first syllable should be emphasized. This could be fixed just by changing the hairpins a little bit. I also think one foreseeable problem is balance. Your initial divisi already places more weight on top simply because there will be more people singing soprano and alto than tenor, baritone, and bass. Generally you want to have fewer people on the top parts because they tend to be more audible. I also support the addition of a G (probably in Tenor II) and would also suggest the addition of an F in the Alto. I think other than that it should work pretty well. Some of the harmonies are really nice. :)

Beautiful!

Yeah, we're having to correct those too; we're doing it in U of U Singers. The choir that performed this is wonderful! I'm pretty jealous! The piece itself it beautiful, too, and definitely conveys the imagery you were trying to portray. I really want to hear the other movements, now!

The following cycle of pieces was written for the Robert Campbell Endowed Choral Composition Contest hosted by Ithaca College in the year 2010 (but it did not win). It is meant to be a humorous set of pieces based on the popular children’s singing games “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” “London Bridge is Falling Down,” and “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.” They are programmatic pieces, using the familiar melodies in new ways to depict different “apocalyptic” scenarios. They are not meant to be performed in any particular order, and are listed alphabetically here simply for neatness. This is not to say, however, that they should not be performed in alphabetical order; on the contrary, the director is free to decide how to organize the three pieces. “Einstein-Rosen Bridge Over the Thames” uses atonal techniques such as whole-tone-based sections, octatonic sections, and highly chromatic sections. An “Einstein-Rosen Bridge” is a theoretical concept involving black holes actually being worm holes that tunnel through space and time. This may seem entirely innocuous, but if a black hole actually formed over London (such as, say, during a freak Hadron Collider accident), it would prove apocalyptic. All of London would inevitably be spaghettified! “Evil Clone Sheep” uses modal writing and at the end quotes Veljo Tormis’ Autumn Landscapes. It is based on something my [extremely conservative] extended family once said (don’t get me wrong, I love them very much): that Dolly, the clone sheep, was inevitably soulless and a creature of the Devil. This brought to mind imagery of an army of evil clone sheep doing the Devil’s bidding and taking over the world! This flippant attitude is not meant to show any disdain for the overall immorality of cloning, but rather the humor in the mental picture of “evil” sheep. “Extra-Terrestrial Encounter” uses aleatoric devices to depict an outer-space alien invasion and the ensuing destruction. Three Apocalyptic Nursery Rhymes MIDI of "Evil Clone Sheep" MIDI of "Einstein-Rosen Bridge Over the Atlantic" There is no MIDI of "Extra-Terrestrial Encounter" because it wouldn't make much sense.

Ah, thanks! I think I fixed the hand-cramping issue, anyway. It's actually being premiered this coming Wednesday at Utah State University so I guess we'll see! The space that it's being premiered in actually has a fairly low reverb, but they're bringing in an electric organ, so it could be a little interesting. I think it will go well, though. :) Also, on a side note, I love Michael McGlynn! Actually, the choir that is premiering my piece will also be performing his "Christus Resurgens". The director of the choir is practically obsessed with Michael McGlynn, and that's how I was exposed. Good stuff, although I hadn't realized a similarity to his work in "Gaudete omnes" until now.

I suppose I should specify that I use Finale 2008, just to be clear. Edit: Also, I think I might have a choir lined up to perform this. The director is just waiting to see if he'll have a good enough organist this year. XD

Oscar, thanks so much for your enlightening comments! As for the score, I'm glad you like it! Sometimes I have trouble keeping my scores clean, so it's good to know my efforts have paid off (although I think there's still editing to be done, especially with slurring in the second half). I use Finale on the normal Maestro font. Or did you want to know the text fonts?

I'm surprised you're the first person that's said anything about that (I have posted this elsewhere, too)! I keep meaning to go back and try again to fix that, but I was having trouble before because of what was reverberating before it. I'll try again, though.

That's not true at all. The hexachords were ordered, and I use the complete row much more than you might at first assume. It's fine if you still wouldn't call it "serial", but just because it's not traditional Schoenberg serialism does not mean that it is not, in fact, serial. In any case, it's kind of a silly point to argue, because I like the piece as it is and that's really all that matters. Also, I realize it's quite short, but that was part of my feelings on the night. Sorry about the problems with the sheet music of the first movement; I've literally spent hours working on it and still keep finding things that I've missed. Thanks for pointing those things out.

I agree that the first movement is far too repetitive. I think there were some very nice moments, but they tended to be obscured by all of the cumbersome repetitions. I personally feel like the second movement feels more like childhood than the first movement does. I think one thing that is needed in the piece is some more rhythmic variety. Most of the piece feels very rhythmically straight, and it leaves me wanting something a little more playful and interesting. The moments when you do offset the rhythm a little bit are very nice. There are some really nice surprising harmonies mixed in with the tonal harmonies, which I enjoyed a lot.

A musical encapsulation of some of my feelings regarding the day and the night."the Day" utilizes a lot of octatonicism and is based on the compositional technique of Stravinsky, but also has some French influences"the Night" utilizes 12-tone serialism, but not necessarily in the way that you would expect. Piano Trio No. 1