Matt,
I really don't recall another work of yours, but I do remember you posting about my music!
some random thoughts and some other ideas, etc...
Notation
Now this is a beautiful score! I like it very much. As a person, I would probably clutter things a bit, and save a few pages (I always tend to do that), and not leave the space of half a system between systems, but that's just me.
Everything is very well laid out, you have given very precise directions to your players (hope it DOES get performed), and the piano, is very well laid out as well, with the 3 staves where needed.
There are a few things that clash, for example bar 21 Cl 2 the mp with the notehead, bar 24, the 8vb sign with the duration dotted note on the accel beam. etc.. cannot see them all, too tired right now, but have it proof read, although these ARE details indeed.
I would expect to see bar numbers in page long systems, at least on the piano, since it's a fair 'walk' away from the first staff to show bar numbers.
Other than that, wonderful!
harmony
I really liked your harmonic ideas and the coherency in which you stood in! I will admit that, even me, I'm not a full fan of the full dissonance all the way, and the few distinct places where the woods were not so dissonant gave me pleasure. Since you did mention the word I will say that it may turn a bit 'stagnant', possibly to the lack of new material, although ideas are flowing there! Could be the midi file as well, of course, and I'm sure that a live recording will do justice to the piece!
Composition elements
No matter the above, and no matter that I liked it, I have to say that at some point I felt it a little 'directionless'. I like very much the idea of a graphic score as a guide to the final one, however.
Still at some points (again could be the midi), I was left wondering. It certainly is a work that deserves more than one listens but:
Rendering
My sound card and many pro ones do NOT have GM synth inside. This means that I actually CANNOT listen to midi files! So I actually had to import the file into Cubase and in a hurry I added piano sounds (pianoteq) to all the staves to have a listen. My imagination did the rest. Hardly a cool way to listen to such an elaborate piece of music!
I'm suspecting that you're using Finale, and possibly an older version. Old Finale versions have a bug that keeps notes hanging till the end and this HAD happened to your piece. could be mistaken.
If, however, the version is somewhat new, or anyways it is Sibelius, with some decent sounds, it would help to toy a little and create an mp3 for us poor poor little people who won't get to listen to it live!
BTW, why on earth are you NOT allowed to post your own music? I'm assuming you're studying since you mention 'finals', so I'm also assuming that your music gets played in workshops, etc. In which case I'm fairly sure that nobody will 'hang you' if you post the mp3s here! You cannot sell them, sure (although it depends really), but showing to a few friends won't hurt now, will it?
Please?
Pretty please?
With sugar on top?
Either way, thanks for sharing and thanks for posting such a well crafted and most probably (damn midi) wonderful music. (Patterns work very well I find!)