PCC Posted March 12 Posted March 12 Took me long enough to share this with you... the timing is also quite good if you consider some of my explanations I guess Introduction Spoiler This sonata originally had another identity as a "sonatina", but it had relatively substantial second and third movements, so I tried to shorten the first and fourth movements, resulting in a really unbalanced composition. So the original outer movements were discarded. The finale was written relatively smoothly, but the first movement, which is presented here, took my a lot of struggle to get to where I think the music can speak for itself (and spoilers, not really still). I titled it "Passio" as the sonata revolves around the idea of the holy week. It is not a liturgical reenactment or as descriptive as Liszt's Via Crucis, of course (or artfulness, for that matter), but it is something I could meditate while playing the piece. I went back to the original discard movements to fish out themes though. By the way, this year's holy week is about two weeks away from now. Context Spoiler Throughout most of the movements in the sonata, some monophonic melodies are being featured. These are copied from known Gregorian chants that is relevant to the moment of the piece. For example, the introduction of this movement is drawn from the entrance antiphon for Passion "Palm" Sunday. The main themes of the movement proper is also drawn from chant, this time from the proclamation of the gospel. When the chant is used on Passion Sunday and Good Friday, there will be three cantors instead of the usual one, as the text is more of a dialogue/narrative style. Unfortunately it is quite uncommon to find a place nowadays to chant the whole gospel. This site has the passion chant for all four gospels (https://gregoriana.sk/2007/02/passio-domini-nostri/). Primer for the music itself Spoiler hw sonata new recorded 1.pdf The entrance chant is in tenor clef because... it looks more chant-like and most of you people have to make an effort to adjust The first theme is the persistent narration tone from the proclamation. It diverges from bar 22 where the texture becomes more polyphonic. Bar 32 has the second theme, the five-note descent, which appears in the chant just before whenever a statement is made. In the sonata it is however used the same way as the first theme for being persistent. The closing theme features two ideas. The first is the middle-low-high three-note motif, which is marked with a cross on the score. These notes are intended to be played with a vertical palm so as to resemble making a sign of cross. The second is in bar 53 with the turn motif, again draw from the chant material. It will later come back as the beginning of the development section of the movement. (btw, there is the option to skip repeating the exposition if you don't play the stuff in between the dotted barlines... though I feel like the repeat is worthwhile, I am not too strong on this matter for this movement if there is a musical explanation for the contrary) The development first had a series of modulation quickly leading back to the key of C in bar 130. The false recapitulation is broken by the loud low E flat in bar 136. The "passio" theme finally is developed from bar 142 onwards. Imagine of the noise and arguments under Pontius Pilate, only to lead to the trip up mount Golgotha, and finally the nailing happened. The earth is shaken (Bar 170) and the tearing of the veil of the Holy of Holies is demonstrated by the contrary motion glissando. The true recapitulation comes after but the atmosphere is more of reflection/reminiscence so the themes seem more fragmented. The second movement is meant to come right after the first "attaca" but I will upload that a bit later. Sorry for the walls of text lol, if you prefer just let the music speak for itself it is also fine. MP3 Play / pause JavaScript is required. 0:00 0:00 volume > next menu 01 hw1 > next PDF hw sonata new recorded 1 2 Quote
Henry Ng Tsz Kiu Posted April 5 Posted April 5 Hey @PCC, On 3/12/2024 at 10:16 AM, PCC said: The entrance chant is in tenor clef because... it looks more chant-like and most of you people have to make an effort to adjust Actually it takes me more effort to read with those ridiculously huge “PCC” watermark than those tenor clefs LoL….. I feel like the movement is repeated. Where is the repeated sign? It’s hard to listen while following the score since it’s not the score you are playing LoL! I think you are really ambitious here. The motivic treatment and the theme are very like Liszt here. Many passages are living in the moment with the images you are depicting, like the crucifixion and crosses. I am treating the movement more like a romantic character piece than a sonata form regulated one since the momentary imagery is important than the structure here. Maybe for me there are too many motives here to be recognised so I don’t recognise any of them at all LoL! I don’t the piece with the paradigm of sonata form in my head but instead with momentary climaxes, and I don’t think it’s a bad thing. I like your playing of your own piece! (Btw I enjoy your hiccup between somewhere LoL!) Thx for sharing! I will take my time to go through the rest of the piece. Henry 1 Quote
PCC Posted April 6 Author Posted April 6 On 4/5/2024 at 9:28 PM, Henry Ng Tsz Kiu said: I feel like the movement is repeated It is... basically, but not 100% exactly (it's like Chopin's B-flat minor scherzo where each repeat changed just one or two small things) On 3/12/2024 at 10:16 AM, PCC said: option to skip repeating the exposition if you don't play the stuff in between the dotted barlines yeah there lol --- On 4/5/2024 at 9:28 PM, Henry Ng Tsz Kiu said: not the score you are playing wdym lolwut --- On 4/5/2024 at 9:28 PM, Henry Ng Tsz Kiu said: more like a romantic character piece than a sonata form I think you're right. I guess I was just trying to stretch the sonata form ever so much to see how far I can go before I break it. I'm partially inspired by Liszt's Via Crucis, so I guess I did do some similar things here On 4/5/2024 at 9:28 PM, Henry Ng Tsz Kiu said: your hiccup between being bad at page turning and giving up on even perfecting basic elements of the piece... my apologies 🙇♂️ On 4/5/2024 at 9:28 PM, Henry Ng Tsz Kiu said: Maybe for me there are too many motives here to be recognised maybe it has to do with me not being a good speaker irl either, so my music unfortunately reflects that but also maybe it will make more sense at the end of the whole sonata But I'm glad you enjoyed so far. Don't rush it like I did reviewing stuff haha Quote
Henry Ng Tsz Kiu Posted April 6 Posted April 6 9 hours ago, PCC said: but also maybe it will make more sense at the end of the whole sonata But I'm glad you Yeah I will definitely try finishing the whole sonata once I have time! Quote
Thatguy v2.0 Posted April 22 Posted April 22 Alright, let's get this out of the way. Why would anyone copy you over Rachmaninoff (which they can for free)? Or Mozart (which they can for free), or Beethoven (which they can for free), or... you get my point? Why the annoying diarrheic PCC over the score? Can't you just put your name as a copyright at the bottom of every page? Even if you want to keep your anonymousness, can't you still do that while saying PCC at the bottom? And if you're that paranoid, post it on Youtube or another platform that won't go under in the near future. Once you post online, your piece is copyrighted. And if you're STILL paranoid, why bother posting a score in the first place??? If you said, "hey, I don't feel comfortable posting the score online", no one would fault you. ANYWAY, On 4/5/2024 at 8:28 AM, Henry Ng Tsz Kiu said: Maybe for me there are too many motives here to be recognised so I don’t recognise any of them at all LoL! I don’t the piece with the paradigm of sonata form in my head but instead with momentary climaxes, and I don’t think it’s a bad thing. I agree with our dear beloved friend Henry. Although, I like your more unique approach to the form, and I think it works. One of my favorite things to do musically is to take a form and expand or revise it in some way. Your piece isn't the "typical" sonata form, but you do a lot of cool, almost improvisatory things in the exposition and other moments that in my eyes make the form more of a guideline rather than a concrete formula. Very cool. I listened to this a few times (mostly without the score 😛), and the repeat was crucial to me. It helped create a picture of the form when I would get lost. Very nice. Just when I thought I was getting lost, and even if the themes felt disjointed in difficulty and material, the repeat made it all work, and helped me know where you were once I heard it. Disjointed material can work together, but maybe in the future I would continue to explore ways to make it bond more seamlessly. For instance, your tempo is very rubato throughout, and if you had more sections where we could feel even something as small as a constant rhythmic pulse could do wonders in making your sections more cohesive. You seem to have a flair for the drama, and those moments were my favorite. All in all, very unique to my ears, and a wonderful performance. I love all of the emotion you pour into this; I can feel it with your playing. Your music is thoughtful and evocative, and I'm excited to continue listening to your playing/music. Well done 🙂 2 Quote
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