Frenetic orchestral piece

I have recently started revising my old orchestral pieces and realising them using a variety of sample packages. This piece is three and a half minutes of raw energy for orchestra that i have realised using EWQLSO Gold XP. There were a few polyphony issues at first but I seem to have eradicated them in the end. The main issue in this piece is the balance between brass and the rest of the orchestra. This is really brass feature piece so I have pushed them forward a little at the expense of the rest of the orchestra. In general the orchestral brass would normally drown out the rest of the orchestra anyway so I have tried to reflect this. Of course when you have written a piece and know all the details in it you really want everything to show through but I think this would be impractical. So the woodwind tends to be a bit lost. i haven't posted a score but probably could if anyone is interested.

IMHO, you've got a handy concert opener here.

If the intention is to make this piece available for live performance at some stage, it's probably worth posting the score here (...if possible with tacet staves removed to save excessive scrolling. Best to show all instruments on the first system, though, so we know what forces we're dealing with.)

An idea: if the extended high brass passages look too taxing, you might consider using two concertante sections of brass placed apart from the main body of the orchestra; these sections could throw phrases back and forth. Saves players' chops, looks festive ... everyone's a winner!

Also: you might want to check out some John Adams scores – he's the dude at this sort of thing. (Ummm: the "Short Ride in a Fast Machine" composer ... not the president, serial killer or Bounty mutineer.)

ablyth

Whenever someone makes a comment on any of my posts, I go out of my way to try to return the favor. I see that I have commented on one of yours before and am happy to again. Some of us here follow that and some will occasionally comment, while others just will not come out of their own little world to admit the existence of others.

I enjoyed this, but I see it as more incidental music than a standalone piece. There isn't much development and the piece sort of just describes things. None of that is bad.

Keep commenting on other's works and you will get some to return the favor.

Ron

Thanks Ron. Yes there is not much development in this piece. It is one of eight movements alternating fast and slow and I think I was interested in just capturing a certain energy without going onto lengthy development. However there is no programme. If anyone is still interested, I have just updated the file with a better mix where the strings are not so much to the front and you can get more of the other sections.

Great orchestral idea, Ablyth...

Original and very striking chord combination, that is kept all until the end...
I really enjoyed listening to this, already after the first seconds!

What a great opening scene for a new Indiana Jones movie! I see a fast running train...

Fred

Ablyth

The mix is better, but you want to try to keep realistic when you can. When the brass is at its loudest, in other parts, the winds cannot be as loud. Does that make sense to you?

When the brass first comes in loud, I think there is some distortion there as well. At 1:56 and a couple of times after. It's no big deal, just a little distortion.

Still a nice piece for movies etc.

Ron

Yes thanks Fredrik. The main point of this piece is really just to grab your attention with a sudden burst of energy.

Thanks Rolifer. Yes getting the balance right in this piece is what I am having some difficulty with so there might be a bit of distortion. Part of the difficulty is that I want everything to be heard but this is not practical or what actually happens when you hear a piece as a listener. But when you write a piece you want people to hear all the little details you know are in there.
One of the difficulties was getting the right weight of brassiness without pushing the piece into distortion. Then there was the other problem that my computer was pushed pretty much to the limit in terms of polyphony and managing the number of notes it had to process.
Anyway I will keep working on this and dream of getting a few more computers to manage the load.

Rolifer, in reply to your question from another thread, I was going to use EWQLSO Gold in this piece but it stretched my computer too far. So, I think, the brass ended up coming from Gold and the strings and ww from Silver. And yes I have recently upgraded to Platinum but haven't had the courage to install it yet as I think my computer will just give up the ghost. So now i am considering getting into networking.