Lake Michigan Scenes (Symphonic Band)

Hi everyone! Here's something I've been working on for a bit here.

This work for symphonic band is a musical illustration of six scenes throughout the course of a day on Lake Michigan.

I. Sunrise
The gentle sounds of woodwinds along with the shushing of the waves signals the beginning of the day.

II. Morning and a Brisk Wind
Morning has broken, and it's a fine day for sailing. The brass choir introduces the main theme.

III. Mid-day, Clouds on the Horizon
The woody sounds of the clarinet section and vibraphones illustrate the calm before the storm while the trumpet explores another theme. The approaching storm becomes evident as the band begins to swell.

IV. An Afternoon Thunderstorm
Suddenly a violent storm whips up with wild rhythms and vicious percussion hits. 

V. A Gentle Evening Rain
The storm is over as quickly as it begins though, leaving a gentle rain illustrated by the snapping of fingers and a calm iteration of the main theme by the clarinets and low brass. 

VI. Sunset
Like the day began, it ends in glorious light before the final exclamation.

Fun little thing, the trumpet motif is the sixth, first, and sixth scale degrees. My area code here in Western Michigan is 616. That was the idea that started this whole thing.

Hello @JordanRoberts,

For me this is quite a beautiful descriptive piece depicting the scenes! 

The beginning Sunrise is beautiful, though I think the splashy sound effect seems unnecessary for me. It reminds me more a fairy than a lake to be honest. I love the awakening effect by having notes and instruments gradually join in like the beginning of the slow movement of Beethoven's op.135. The crescendo is very effective to the next section!

I like how bright the brass is in b.35; however I think the woodwind in b.40 seems overwhelmed.

The clarinet in section 3 is beautiful! But I really hate that splashy sound effect!!!!!🤣 It makes the music more artificial instead of more natural. For me personally I don't think the trumpet theme develops well since it appears in too short of amount of time and then the swelling comes. You can explore more on the theme and have it end properly before getting to the thunderstorm in my opinion. 

The thunderstorm for me is too brief. Maybe you are trying to imitate Beethoven's Pastoral here? Since there's no tremolo here as there's no strings as in Bee's piece, and the whirling of woodwinds isn't a good substitution for it. And it's not as climactic as it's promised! That makes the subsequent conclusion weaker since the climax is not pushed for me.

The clarinet of the gentle evening part is lovely! It's quite rare to have woodwinds featured in the piece though as you are a brass player? But the ending is perfect for the serene atmosphere, except for the sea, raining and splashy sound effect. I like you are connecting the sunset with sunrise by having similar sustained notes, but here it's only in the woodwinds. Then suddenly the crescendo at the end ruins the serene mood and for me it's not quite reasonable. I may just have the music ends in ppp instead. Why do you choose to end in fff for a sunset? For me this is an unnatural and strange choice.

I may be nitpicky, but I do enjoy this piece. Thanks for sharing and don't forget to press the button for reputation point lol!

Henry

Great job!  I've already expressed how effective I think this music is at its storytelling.  I think my favorite part of the piece is the heroic brass choir melodies.  Those parts actually remind me a bit of James Horner's score to Apollo 13.  I do wonder how you produced this rendition of this piece - maybe it contains a combination of artificial and recorded sounds?  Like the shushing and the snapping of the fingers to signify the waves and the rain, respectively, is very creative, but hard to accomplish in a computer rendition of the music.  I also thought the ending crescendo was a bit unexpected and inappropriate for a calm sunset.  Maybe you just wanted to let the audience know when they should clap?  LoL Thanks for sharing!

I decided to come back to this after chatting with my composition professor. The 13/16 bars weren't terribly useful, and he gave the same feedback regarding the last measure. This is going to be premiered live this summer by a semi-pro wind ensemble in Michigan and in the meantime, we will be having a reading/recording session with the Grand Valley State University Symphonic Wind Ensemble.

Here's the updated score and mp3.

Simply, a nice work, very good use of silences and dynamics. Sometimes the texture is almost transparent and rather beautiful. Good rendering.

I felt the storm could have been more tempestuous but you declare it to be brief. The close was magical except the final chord was perhaps a bit too powerful.

An easy work to which to listen. Most enjoyable. 

On 1/25/2024 at 12:19 AM, JordanRoberts said:

I decided to come back to this after chatting with my composition professor. The 13/16 bars weren't terribly useful, and he gave the same feedback regarding the last measure. This is going to be premiered live this summer by a semi-pro wind ensemble in Michigan and in the meantime, we will be having a reading/recording session with the Grand Valley State University Symphonic Wind Ensemble.

Here's the updated score and mp3.

 

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• Lake Michigan Scenes - Score

Wow, myself being a Michigan native, I do get the sense of our Great Lakes beauty from this.  I would still say try to add a little more counterpoint to bridge your ideas.  Still, VERY strong writing in this piece.  You study with Bill Ryan?  I haven't met him but I certainly know of him.

Yes, I study with Bill. He's awesome! He has really helped me define my own composing voice despite being an older student with a lot of experience. I started this program at 33.