Theme and Variations

Hello all,

I haven't posted a piece in a little while so thought I'd share one of my favourite recent works.

This piece was written for a young composer competition here in the UK. It was shortlisted (!) and as such I was lucky to receive an astonishingly high quality recording by a period string quartet.

I then decided to submit it to the Youtube channel TheExarion for the August 2022 Original Compositions video. Did anyone else from this forum enter a piece? It's a fantastic collection of almost 9 hours of new music!

Rather than uploading the score and recording for copyright reasons, I have linked TheExarion's score video below. Hopefully the video will start from my piece, but if not, you can skip to 07:36:00.

(There is also a programme note and performance note in the score-video, but I can copy it into a post if anyone would prefer.)

Hope you enjoy the piece, and any feedback will be much appreciated!

Wow, great music. I love the way you keep the "classic" atmosphere, but making a modern piece. Var.nº 3 is delightful. also nº 4.... 

I will save the entire video for the future, though I stumbled upon a certain piano composition and it was kind of a mess (probably the almost plain midi helped giving me a questionable impression) but it surely has some gems. Now, briefly regarding your composition:

• It starts dancing in an unstable line between dissonance and consonance. I really liked your approach, and in this regard I agree with Luis. The real interpretation is definitely wonderful and helps so much in details where software doesn't easily reach. Also yeah, confirmed that the video starts with your piece.
• The 3rd variation is possibly my favourite; there're lots of dynamic contrasts dwelling that short time span.
• I felt like Var. 4th could have been more developed but it was also very fresh to listen. 
• I am very nit-picky with endings, sorry. In this case, I would have done without the last bar, but I get that it creates a surprising, strong and solid final moment. 

Thank you for sharing not only your piece but this 8 hour monster video!

Kind regards,
Daniel–Ømicrón.

I love this piece! It's not really classical for my taste, but the sound is so broad! I agree with @Omicronrg9 with everything he said: The 3rd variation is also my favourite with the flow and the accompaniments provided by real and great musicians. I cannot imagine how catastrophic it would be if played by software instruments. For the 4th variation, had the competition had no time limit, I would like to have the fugato much longer to be a fugal section! That's really wonderful but here there's only the seed to be grown!! The ending is quite abrupt for me. If the lingering passage of bar 70-71 can be longer, then the coda ultima will be much more effective! But given the limitation on time, I guess this is the best!!

This is really really wonderful! I like how you constantly walk a fine line between consonant and dissonant harmony. 4 is very lyrical, and the fugato, if rushed, is a perfect conclusion. Thank you for sharing and congrats!

Thank you all so much for your kind words and feedback!

@Omicronrg9 @Henry Ng - indeed, I agree with you that there is room for more development of each variation, particularly, as you mention, Var. 3 and the fugato. Unfortunately the competition did have a limit of 4 minutes - if I did revise this piece in future (considering adding some more movements to create a full contemporary/classical period fusion quartet) then I would certainly look at seeing if I could expand these sections. The fugato was tough though, trying to 'walk the line' between colourful harmony and excessive dissonance and counterpoint not being a massive strength of mine making it very difficult. I probably would struggle to expand it much more at the moment, but this is certainly something I could come back to in the fullness of time as it were.

@Omicronrg9 - oh, the ending... I have a minor reputation among the people who know me for writing endings that I love, but other people find 'tacky', 'random' or 'surprising.' In a future revision, I'd keep this last bar but expand the half-tempo section before. I must say though, the effect worked surprisingly well in performance!

Once again, thank you for taking the time to leave comments! 

Very cool piece!

I generally don't care for a language so dissonant, but I think between your craftsmanship and the brilliant live performance this one worked well. 

I've actually listened to this several times over the last week, and it definitely grew on me. You develop your material from the theme very well, I liked most of the variations. I will say I didn't care for the fugal section, I just didn't feel it was necessary. For me, if I'm given a shorter time limit, I'd want to keep it simple and really develop the original theme to it's fullest. The fugue felt just thrown in, but tbh I could be missing the point, and it seemed like others really enjoyed it so I'm obviously in the minority. 

I could have done without the ending bars, the sustained notes right before would have made a nice ending, but hey, it's your piece! Do what you want with it, if you like it then I'm happy.

Overall, wonderful work, and again, congratulations on getting this performed, you must be very proud!

I really like this!  The live performance adds so much!  I think the scales leaping over each other in the fugue create a really great propulsive effect.  This definitely wasn't a common approach to fugue and I thought it was really fresh and not contrapuntally overbearing at all like fugues can sometimes be.  My favorite variations though were 2 and 3 although I wish you had come up with more variations!  Seems like the material is ripe for many more varied treatments!  Thanks for sharing this - I really enjoyed it.

On 12/8/2022 at 11:38 AM, aMusicComposer said:

I must say though, the effect worked surprisingly well in performance!

Oh epic! Don't mind me, it's not really a bad ending in any case. The only problem with surprising bits is that they usually work on the first listen only. Despite of that, on a second (and third, and fourth) listen it felt fun, and the more I listened to it the more it convinced me despite not being surprising at all anymore. In fact, I think that was the only "issue" I had with it.

Kind regards!!

28 minutes ago, Omicronrg9 said:

Edited 24 minutes ago by Omicronrg9
I'm sleepy, many typos and mistakes. Sorry.

What an LOL reason that is🤣.

After a second listening, still find the fugato too short. Either as @Thatguy v2.0 said to cancel that section to fully develop other variations, or to develop it more in a revised and longer version! I feel like a pity to have the fugato section appears only momentarily! Really would like to see its extension and development in your upcoming revision!

In the first listening I felt the ending abrupt, but during a second listening I find out that bar 70-71 comes from the original theme, while the last bar comes from variation 4 the fugato. It is really humorous to end this way, but my personal preference is also finding it abrupt even in the second listen😅 since bar 70-71 is so contemplative. It's not like in the ending of Beethoven's Grosse Fugue where he revisited the previous materials in a film montage fashion, since that piece is much longer. I really wish the coda to be longer in your revision too!!

Thank you for your comments!

It's interesting to see that there is a general consensus on the fugue being too short and the ending perhaps too abrupt. As I have said above, in any future revision I'll of course take on all this feedback! I'm also looking to enter the competition again next year (for brass ensemble + organ) so the main things I will take away would be to develop develop develop material as much as possible, with fewer ideas to fit into the time limit - and of course work out a showstopping ending!

@Thatguy v2.0 - Thanks so much for the comment - I couldn't be happier with the performance and the quartet really had a way of elevating each piece to extraordinarily musical works! This semi-dissonant clustery language is something I use quite a lot at the moment, glad to hear you enjoyed it in this piece. You do seem to be in the minority about the fugue - I'm not going to take it out because it's fairly important to the concept of the piece, but lengthening it significantly would I think help with it feeling 'stuck-on'. And yes, I agree with you that keeping a smaller number of ideas would maybe have been better for this time limit.

13 hours ago, PeterthePapercomPoser said:

I really like this!  The live performance adds so much!  I think the scales leaping over each other in the fugue create a really great propulsive effect.  This definitely wasn't a common approach to fugue and I thought it was really fresh and not contrapuntally overbearing at all like fugues can sometimes be.  My favorite variations though were 2 and 3 although I wish you had come up with more variations!  Seems like the material is ripe for many more varied treatments!  Thanks for sharing this - I really enjoyed it.

Thank you! I'm happy to hear that the fugue wasn't too dry/plain/derivative, I was aiming to keep it a bit quirky through the texture and counterpoint. Of course I would have loved more variations - sadly time limits are sent to try us! My favourite variation is no. 2. Interestingly I don't like no. 3 as much but it seems to be popular among these commenters! Also Peter, I have just noticed your signature - made me laugh!

Another big thank you for all your comments!