Quote:
Originally Posted by QcCowboy
P.S. the "fanfare" you keep refering to is only the opening half dozen measures of an otherwise non-fanfare-ish 6-minute long symphony movement. I'm preplexed that that single aspect of the work is all that seems to have caught your attention. Not the "noble" theme that actually opens the symphony (right after the fanfare), nor the dreamy adagio 2nd theme.... in a way, that disappoints me more.
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What I refer to is the dotted rhythmic figure you use to introduce the work. You're developing the idea through the entire first movement, and I hear it constantly throughout. It's dull. Either the contour needs more shape, or the rhythm needs more variety. That's not to impune the rest of your work. The fanfare within the first movement is disappointing. You can do more to make it interesting if you're going to use it the way you're using it.
Measure 3, you have the dotted rhythm entrance, like a piece of the figure. That's fine. Measure 25, the Bassoons play the figure almost literally like a scale on the beat with no syncopation. Measures 30-1, you have Horns playing the rhythm with no real shape to the gesture. The Trumpets start to climb the scale like the Bassoons before in measure 32, then just oscillate in the dotted patter in measure 33. The theme is interspersed within all of this, but the fanfare element is just bringing it down. I'll continue... (the Clarinet entrance in Measure 40 is very nice... I love what you're doing here)
Moving on to measure 48, I'm at a point of arrival in the form. I see the same dotted fanfare, the same dull use of interval, the same lack of expression. Truthfully, this is a let down. There's so much more you could choose to do with it here. If nothing else, you can cut loose with the fanfare at this point and break the mold you've been creating for it in the first minute or so of the work. That would be cool. Either way, THIS point of arrival is disappointing. Every note on every downbeat moves up by a second. I'm listening to a scale in dotted rhythmic form, and there's no contrary motion between the Fanfare idea and the gesture in the woodwinds. Everything is moving in the same direction if you consider the dotted B/C# down to F#/G# then back UP to B/C#. And what are your strings doing? Up, up, up... scalar. Boring.
Moving on to measure 58 and 59 between the Horn and Trumpet. You have the same upward, almost linear motion. Measure 60, we do have some variety in the way you begin to develop the idea and finally begin seeing some descending activity, but it's too little far too late. The fanfare is on life support, and now we have to debate on whether to keep the feeding tube in place. We have the same problem with the gesture in the woodwinds a few measures later. Beats one and two of the last measure of page 7, both the same notes, same intervals, the same direction. At this late in the work, this is just killing it for me. I have nothing to hold onto because you're busy complicating things for me harmonically while leaving me wanting more from you linearly.
As you can see, I can go on. I'm perplexed as to why you are confused about this... your fanfare motive is EVERYWHERE in the first movement (not just the first dozen measures), and it doesn't really help you. It's just there. Every time I hear it I'm waiting for it to do something and it doesn't until it's too late. Like I said, you haven't given me anything to hold onto, anything to follow. Sorry if you disagree with this, but as you can see just from the first 60 measures, your "Fanfare" COMES BACK continuously doing the same, dull thing by reiterating a linear scale.