Elegy

This is a piece I recently wrote. I was inspired by looking upon so many problems that are going on in the world, as well as being inspired by problems going on in my own personal life.

Hi @SergeOfArniVillage,

I love this piece! The pathos and passions are so authentic, even though this is just a computer rendition. It really shows that what you are facing in your own life, which is what I am sorry about.

I love the opening section! The chord progression is great. I love all those suspensions and the augmented chords. I like those 2 beat empty bars too! I do that myself and it gives a feeling or unspeakable suffering. 

For me the Allegro section reminds me Beethoven's pathetique sonata: the chord progression, sentence structure, texture. But your harmonic language is more complex. B.49 is the further development of the b.33 theme in triplets. B.60-61 reminds me of Rach texture. I like your return to the opening section in b.65-74, and again the structure reminds me of the Pathetique Sonata. In b.76 you start a new theme, and b.92-102 reminds me the texture of Sakamoto Ryūichi and I love the texture very much. Then the Beethovanian portion returns and the texture is becoming thicker and thicker. B.126-127 reminds me the XXVIII variation of Bee's Diabelli Variation. The ending outburst is very powerful and I absolutely like this, perhaps extending the ending chord a bit longer will be even better!

This is real emotional music. Congrats on this and hopefully by writing this you can find some relieve! Thanks for sharing and welcome back to YC!

Henry

Hi! I was amazedby this piece when I first heard it!

I don't know of you want a 'old classical' piece or a 'nee classical' style (i know the choose of words is weird but i don't have enough lexicon hahaha), some parts and chords treatment aren't accepted by conservatories but are accepted by modern musical genres. For example: there are several parallel fifths, parallel octaves, and sometimes you reach a fifth interval by parallel motion, etc ... ( it has a bit of romanticism style, that's why i found strange some of the treatments)

1 hour ago, Henry Ng Tsz Kiu said:

I like those 2 beat empty bars too! I do that myself and it gives a feeling or unspeakable suffering. 

Yes! It says a lot, but it is nos 'academically correct', a fermata or a caesura would have the same impact! 

Also, in the allegro part, I love the melodic structure (4+5), it doesn't feel unnatural, that means you've done it very well 😅

- b45 section is very much enjoyable!

-b57, using repetition bars for just one bar is not idiomatic

I agree, an emotional work with a mix of traditional and new things. I particularly like some of the transitions between parts.

Hey there

Well this was quite the ride. This is jam-packed with emotional extremes; it's hard not to feel power and heaviness of it. 

I like your style. I've listened to this several times now, and I keep hearing more and more influences. It's like you bake a cake from classical/early romantic music and put modern musical icing on it. It's a cool sound 😄

Along with Beethoven, Rach, and Chopin stuffs, I at times thought of the band Muse. You know them?

I like the overall form, with the choral melodic moments balancing the motivic and vigorous sections. It's a back and forth from A and B sections but varied ways of developing each section. Even the repeated spots are developed further. I like the improvisatory nature within the confines of a well balanced structure. Very cool

There's not much I could say critically (sorry!). Every time I thought of something I'd do differently, I realized it was merely subjective, and actually kind of fun to hear when the unexpected happened. It made me think that I should pay more attention to the fine details of how I'm trying to execute a particular effect. I'm mainly thinking of your usage of sudden dynamic changes and texture choices. 

For instance, in the first choral type section (the intro), you went back and forth between 3 and 4 voices. Sometimes it felt like the texture got weirdly thin, maybe even awkwardly. But was that intentional for effect? Either way, I don't see it as between right and wrong, just compositional choices that are interesting to me. 

As far as the 2/4 measures of rest, I like it. In fact, the spacing you give in the lamentation sections are one of the best parts. What if you made one of the 3/4 or something? Might be a cool variation, especially if the section is a fixed tempo without rubato. 

I wasn't super satisfied with the ending...Idk though. I'll think about this some more and edit the post with some ideas if it comes to me. 

Overall though, this was great to listen to, and a wonderful (although maybe tragic? 😞) reintroduction to your music. I look forward to hearing more from you, whether it's your music or thoughtful advice. 

Thank you all for taking time to listen to my piece 🙂

@Henry Ng Tsz Kiu (As far as I know, we didn't have this ability to "at" people when I was here last, so this is pretty cool!) Thank you for your thoughts. I'm glad the authenticity of the performance is shining through, because that's always my goal with a MIDI playback. I didn't even think about similarities to Beethoven's Pathetique, but now that you say it, it is quite similar. Also, I've never heard Sakamoto Ryuichi's music: I'll have to take time to listen to his music sometime!

@Samuel_vangogh Thank you! For me personally, my musical philosophy is simply, "if it works, it works, and if it doesn't, it doesn't." So I have no interest in whether something is academically correct or not, but rather, do I personally find something to be an effective choice, or not. Parallel 5ths can sound very sloppy in some contexts, and sound beautiful in other contexts, after all. 

@Luis Hernández Hey you! Thanks for listening.

@Thatguy v2.0 Thanks Vince! You really hit the nail on the head with the "baking" thing: I've had the exact same thought about my way of composing, and I've often thought that there are strange similarities between cooking and music. I don't think I've heard Muse's music, that's another recommendation I'll have to check out.

If you do come up with any thoughts for the ending, by all means, please share. My first draft of the piece had a significantly worse ending, where mss. 126 to the end didn't exist, and it just ending on a Cm on ms. 126. When I listened to it a few times, I was like, "there's no way I can end the piece like this." I'm open to more suggestions to "improve" it further, with the condition that it doesn't end in a "happy" or "positive" way, which I think would really undermine the piece.

24 minutes ago, SergeOfArniVillage said:

Parallel 5ths can sound very sloppy in some contexts, and sound beautiful in other contexts, after all. 

Yes! Indeed, i'm just saying that romanticism + 'bad' voice leading (i mean, that's not bad yk) is pretty uncommon, but, if they are well prepared [adagio - mahler 5] can be beautiful! 

Soometimes it's better just to forget academic rules 

@SergeOfArniVillage

Beautiful! I think your intro is rock solid. Your ending is a little to abrupt for my taste, but who cares, the piece is excellent. You have some pretty awesome chord progressions in your intro. Then you take it to the classical style, I was surprised. In a good way because it's very Beethoven-esque. Then it sounds like you take it into a pseudo Chopin-like passage. This is super fun to listen to.

I love the pacing of this piece, it really brings out the passion of the emotions you were going through when composing this.

Can I actually nuance this piece and showcase it in another video of mine?  You do a pretty good job with the midi already so that helps me out, especially your intro. But I think I can make this sound even more realistic. And using this beautiful piece in my future videos......is something I'd be proud of doing.

If yes, please send me the midi (via pm).

@Samuel_vangogh Right, I understand where you're coming from. Makes sense to me.

@chopin Wow, thank you! I appreciate your thoughts on the piece. I'm a little surprised you want to use the piece for one of your videos, but sure, I'll send you a MIDI file, and I look forward to your video! I've watched a couple of them, and I've been really impressed with both the transformations, and how you're evidently striving to make the software user-friendly. I love that in particular, because I'm having to use Sibelius as my DAW, which is hardly ideal, and I'm not tech-savvy enough to really understand how to use a proper DAW.

9 hours ago, SergeOfArniVillage said:

I don't think I've heard Muse's music, that's another recommendation I'll have to check out.

They're cool. I mostly know their older stuff, but they a lot of times elude to classical chord progressions in their music which I dig

16 hours ago, SergeOfArniVillage said:

Wow, thank you! I appreciate your thoughts on the piece. I'm a little surprised you want to use the piece for one of your videos, but sure, I'll send you a MIDI file, and I look forward to your video! I've watched a couple of them, and I've been really impressed with both the transformations, and how you're evidently striving to make the software user-friendly. I love that in particular, because I'm having to use Sibelius as my DAW, which is hardly ideal, and I'm not tech-savvy enough to really understand how to use a proper DAW.

You wont be surprised after you hear the recording. I just finished the recording this morning, and the transformation is really good. I'm going to have to have a chat with one of these piano sample vendors when I am ready, and see if I can have it come bundled with Music Jotter. I can work on other sounds little by little, but I want to focus on piano first. What piano samples are you using in this mp3, because they aren't bad sounding? Although your samples are good, the transformation is still rock solid and noticeable. Stay tuned for my next video. Now I have to actually make the video + script.

And as far as your comment about not being tech-savvy enough. This is my biggest point here. People will call me out and say "Oh, Kontakt does this already". Oh yeah? How do you get it to work without having any tech knowledge? How can I connect it to my notation software? How about getting the recording? What about the ultra realism that I am demonstrating, which goes far beyond good instrument samples? Well, you can't do any of this unless you know what tech to use and which techniques to implement. My goal is to make it an all inclusive experience. And if you are still confused, you know who to ask for help as I have a YouTube channel, and I make myself available for questions.

@chopin I use Ivory VST, the Bosendorfer 225 Series piano, and I've modified the Bosendorfer as close as I know how to sound semi-realistic both on the program itself and on Sibelius Artist. It could probably stand to be improved further, but I barely know what half the knobs do 🤷‍♂️

And yes, *exactly*: as to your point on "Kontakt does this already" etc. -- LOL! I'm sure it does, but HOW?! 😆 When I first downloaded a DAW years ago, I absolutely could not make head or tails of it. Usually, I've been able to intuit my way through things, Google my way through things, trial-and-error my way through things ... but honestly, you might as well have asked me to build a rocket capable of traveling to Pluto and back in a season's time. I realized I would need to have someone walk me through it, and explain various things about the program, and I didn't have someone to help me through that, so I just gave up and did the best with what was at least somewhat user-friendly with Sibelius, although I knew the results had a limit, realistically. So the thought of a DAW being so user-friendly is a really AMAZING prospect. Music belongs to the world, and there's no reason to make it artificially difficult, and thus "gatekeep" it against people in some way, when it already is a difficult and intensive thing to learn in and of itself to begin with.