Peacocks Fly Southeast

I wrote a symphonic piece of a string quartet I orchestrated. I've never written for full orchestra, and I have a reading for this piece soon. I'd love to get some feedback. The big problem I'm at is key changes for contrast and expanding current contrasting sections.

Hello,

It is quite lush. I like that it is not overwritten. This looks like it would sound good with a real orchestra. My favorite parts were the times you went for a big contrast. There was one moment everything got loud, when the piccolo joined in, that was especially powerful. You do a good job changing up the aural environments you put this simple melody, which allows the work to convey some unique feelings. This is something I used to do in my works a lot, and I personally love using motifs to give certain sections of music a new meaning.

- Evan

I enjoyed your thematic development and variations.  The work is very cohesive as well as being quite lovely with a precise well balanced orchestration. 🥰

Mark

Hi @jeteren and welcome to the forum!

I love the soundscape - this piece brings to mind Eastern calligraphy/landscape brush paintings.  It's of course also a great depiction of the eponymous peacocks.  The pentatonic scales helped to bring your programmatic content across nicely.  I just realized that it doesn't ever modulate and uses the same exact scale throughout the whole duration of the piece.  But you do bring much musical interest through varying all the other elements of the music such as tempo, orchestration and voicings.  I would be interested to hear what you can do with more than one scale - do you compose using other sonorities/modes as well?  Thanks for sharing!  

8 hours ago, PeterthePapercomPoser said:

I would be interested to hear what you can do with more than one scale - do you compose using other sonorities/modes as well?  Thanks for sharing!  

 

Yeah! Right now I'm interested in folk music and general ethnomusicology in China, so I've been composing based on the style and folk themes of Chinese music. I'm also a big fan of the Dorian mode. Typically my music is very programmatic since my composition experiences have been with ballet. My most recent work would be Coral Astronauts, a string quartet + ballet that uses a blend of cotemporary and folk techniques -