May the Road Rise to Meet You {WIP - Almost complete}

This piece is a nearly complete WIP, based on the Irish Blessing read at my grandfather's funeral in December. Here's a copy of the text:

May the road rise to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
May the rains fall softly upon your fields,
And, until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

It is composed for a small choir (2-3 singers per part minimum, depending on the part, as there are several divided sections), and percussion.

The choir part is virtually finished, but the percussion part is lacking in some sections due to creative/technical difficulties.

Because the text is of personal meaning, emotions expressed by the harmonies & music have personal roots as well. The piece mirrors my initials the initial reaction to his death, my inner turmoil, and eventual closure. While some pieces regarding the grieving process are long and drawn out, this piece is purposefully not so, as his death was not really a suprise. Therefore I was able to say goodbye and proceed to accept his death sooner than otherwise.

Anyway, I'm done talking up a storm, and will let the music do the speaking. I have no recording of this yet, so I have included a score in PDF, a midi file, and a Finale '07 file. I apologize for the state of the score/finale file, as I have not yet fully finished the piece, the score is a mite bit sloppy, but that will be fixed.

Enjoy and comment please!

Personal feelings aside, a blessing set to music from the pits of hell (not as in you suck but as in very dissonant, diminished harmonies) makes no sense whatsoever. Measure 43 to the end is the style that should really be heard throughout the piece.

Ignore Dev. I haven't heard the piece yet, but from an objective aesthetic standpoint, there is no "should."

Okay, I listened to it.

First thing - your notation needs help. Try to read through each line individually and you'll see what I mean, particularly in divisi sections. You've got a place where you move from a B to a Cb in the same measure - unnecessary. Likewise, there's a tenor divisi that moves from a B to a split C#/Eb. It should be written C#/D#, so it's clear that it's a 6th between B and D#, and a 7th between C# and D#.

Your harmonies are nice. I disagree that they sound like they're from hell. Granted, the juxtaposition of the blessing text with the dark harmonic material is unexpected, but it's also awesome because of it. I actually really disliked the sudden shift into consonance. And the ending cadence - it seemed cliché to me. The 4-3 suspension in the tenor... I would have much rather you continued your chromatic explorations, and led them to a consonant cadence, rather than switching to consonance for the last few phrases.

Ignore Christopher. His opinion is worthless too!